June 2 Friday – Charles Webster wrote to Sam about possible hires and the return of Clarence E. Buckland (1851-1905), whom he thought unsuitable, too slow, and an instigator among the men to organize [MTP].
July 13, 1882: Family departs Hartford, spending the night in New York, then boarding a spcial car for the trip to Elmira on the 14th.
September 21, 1882: Sam traveled to Hartford, returning to Elmira the next day.
September 28, 1882: The family departed Elmira for New York then to Hartford on the 29th.
June 1 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to the son of the late Dr. John Brown, John Jr., nicknamed “Jock.” The Clemens family offered condolences. Sam asked for a picture of Dr. Brown.
“I was three thousand miles from home, at breakfast in New Orleans, when the damp morning paper revealed the sorrowful news among the cable dispatches” [MTNJ 2: 500n223]
April 16 Sunday – Sam returned to Hartford, where he wrote Howells.
O dear! I came home jubilant, thinking that for once I had gone through a two-day trip & come out without a crime on my soul: but it was all a delusion, nothing but a delusion—as I soon found out as I glided along in my narrative of how Aldrich—but no, I have suffered enough already, though Mrs. Clemens’s measureless scorn & almost measureless vituperation.
April 15 Saturday – Sam gave a talk at Boston’s Saturday Morning Club. Fatout designates this as “Advice to Youth” [MT Speaking 169-71] but Fatout prefaces this as “date and time uncertain,” the 1882 written later on Sam’s manuscript. Gribben notes that Sam urged youth to read only “good” books, such as Robertson’s Sermons, Baxter’s Saint’s Rest, and Mark Twain’s Innocents Abroad [583].
April 14 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to James R. Osgood, arranging dates for the first leg of the Mississippi River trip.
“All right, call in Apl. 17—and start from New York, at 6 P.M., Pennsylvania road (ain’t it?) Hotel car all the way to Chicago—dam sight better than a mere dam sleeping car. How does this strike you?” [MTLTP 155].
April 13 Thursday – Karl & Hattie J. Gerhardt wrote to Sam and Livy, delighted with the Clemenses letters even though typed. He’d sent Sam’s last letter to a London Publisher and rec’d a valuable dictionary in return. A detailed page or two of their expenses [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “Gerhardt / Part of Expense a/c for 17 ½ months—Mc 17 ’81 to Sept. 1 ’82–/ $900 a year
April 12 Wednesday – Roswell Phelps mailed Sam a contract for his employment, which Sam signed. Phelps was to receive $100 per month for “at least four weeks” work, all traveling and living expenses and for transcribing notes made on the trip by June 1, one dollar per thousand words. The contract is in the MTP [MTNJ 2: 517].
April 11 Tuesday – Office of the Chief of Engineers, U.S. Army per H.M. Adams wrote to advise that “a copy of a map of the alluvial basin of the Mississippi River and 16 sheets of the new map …have been sent by today’s mail” [MTP].
April 10 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to reply to the Apr. 6 compliments from Rutherford B. Hayes, who had expressed a “happy reception” for P&P at his house. After explaining the receipt of his letter came just when their dinner friends were discussing the potential greatness of the Hayes administration (to Sam another example of “Mental Telegraphy”), and being “deeply gratified” by Hayes’ letter, Sam added after his signature: