March 18 Monday – Sam wrote to William Dean Howells, thanking him for sending his book, Their Wedding Journey. Sam wrote:
“I would like to send you a copy of my book, but I can’t get a copy myself, yet, because 30,000 people who have bought & paid for it have to have preference over the author” [MTL 5: 58].
Charles Dudley Warner gave RI a glowing review in the Hartford Courant:
March 15 Friday – Bill paid dated Mar. 11 from D.S. Brooks & Sons, Hartford dealer in “hot air furnaces, cooking ranges, stoves and tin ware, low down grates and Marbelized slate mantles”; $18.50 for fireplace grate & pan, fitting [MTP]. Note: A cheery or cozy fire was an important comfort for the Clemens family.
March 12 Tuesday – Sam had a painful meeting with Elisha Bliss. An unsent draft of Mar. 20 shows that Sam was somewhat reassured by the meeting of this day. Sam probably went to a party at the Hartford home of Joseph R. Hawley, editor of the Hartford Courant. Andrew Hoffman claims that Bliss kept two sets of books [195].
March 7 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Redpath & Fall. Sam remitted less than his bill and haggled over the balance for hiring a train to reach an out-of-the-way lecture. In response to ills plaguing the two men, Sam wrote:
March 4 Monday – The St. Louis Missouri Democrat ran a short item on page two about the newly released RI:
It is not necessary to say one word about this work, as it is already widely known. It is equal to Mark’s Innocents, profusely illustrated and of course no one would think of being without it….[Budd, Reviews 100].
March 3 Sunday – Sam wrote a short note from Hartford to James Redpath, asking for George Fall to send Sam’s bill [MTL 5: 52].
March 2? Saturday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Mary Mason Fairbanks responding to her letter of Feb. 28 and asking for her to visit. He also wrote: “We are getting to work, now, packing up, & fixing things with the servants, preparatory to migrating to Elmira”. Livy probably wanted to have the baby in Elmira [MTL 5: 49].
March – Sam’s sketch “Roughing It” ran in American Publishing Co.’s in-house promotional monthly, American Publisher [Camfield, bibliog.]. Similar to Roughing It, Ch. 57.
Located on a lot of donated land from Amherst College, it was built between the years of 1828 and 1829, to serve as the third meeting house of the First Congregational Church of Amherst. When a new congregational church was built on Main Street in 1868, Amherst College purchased the former church building and its lands. In 1905 the building was rededicated as College Hall, as well as expanded and remodeled, with the addition of new columns to the front.
The Taylor Opera House was built by James S. Taylor, according to the book series, “Images of America, Danbury”. He originally solved the problem of felting hats with the Taylor sizing machines (Danbury was the hat capitol of the world) by machinery. He was born in 1825 and was the great-great-great-grandson of Thomas Taylor, an original settler of Danbury.