August 1876

August – Sometime during the month at Quarry Farm, Sam began “A Record of the Small Foolishnesses of Susie & ‘Bay’ Clemens (Infants)”. The document would grow for nine years [MTNJ 2: 365n32]. (See July 1880 entry.)

July 31, 1876 Monday 

July 31 Monday – Charles E. Perkins wrote to Sam acknowledging his of the 27th with the $3,000 to be invested for Livy. He complained of “infernal hot weather” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “The 21st Thousand invested.”

July 31-August 7 Monday – Sam and Bliss wrote proof notes for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer [MTPO].

July 30, 1876 Sunday 

July 30 Sunday  Sam wrote from Elmira to Montgomery Schuyler, journalist and architectural critic for the New York World, answering his letter of July 25. Sam had done a squib for the World but burned it, and would write another “in coming months.” No doubt he was responding to a request for an article [MTLE 1: 88].

July 26, 1876 Wednesday 

July 26 Wednesday – The Hartford Courant printed “The Boy, the Beetle and the Dog. A Sketch from Mark Twain’s ‘Tom Sawyer,’ in Press.” This was taken from chapter 5 and was independent of Conway’s “London Letter” first sent to the Cincinnati Commercial (See June 26 entry.) It was reprinted Aug. 28 in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch [MTPO notes on July 24 to Conway].

July 24, 1876 Monday

July 24 Monday  Sam wrote from Elmira to Moncure Conway. He’d discovered where The Adventures of Tom Sawyer excerpts in the newspapers were originating from—Moncure’s marketing letters to a Cincinnati paper.

July 23, 1876 Sunday

July 23 Sunday – The Philadelphia Sunday Republic published part of the fence-whitewashing episode of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer [The Twainian, Mar. 1944 p.4].

Charles Dudley Warner wrote from Hartford to Sam, sorry he hadn’t been able to get to Phila. soon enough to see him. He’d read TS “and greatly enjoyed” it. Much of his small scrawl is illegible [MTP]

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