Day By Day Dates

Day by Day entries are from Mark Twain, Day By Day, four volumes of books compiled by David Fears and made available on-line by the Center for Mark Twain Studies.  The entries presented here are from conversions of the PDFs provided by the Center for Mark Twain Studies and are subject to the vagaries of that process.    The PDFs, themselves, have problems with formatting and some difficulties with indexing for searching.  These are the inevitable problems resulting from converting a printed book into PDFs.  Consequently, what is provided here are copies of copies.  

I have made attempts at providing a time-line for Twain's Geography and have been dissatisfied with the results.  Fears' work provides a comprehensive solution to that problem.  Each entry from the books is titled with the full date of the entry, solving a major problem I have with the On-line site - what year is the entry for.  The entries are certainly not perfect reproductions from Fears' books, however.  Converting PDFs to text frequently results in characters, and sometimes entire sections of text,  relocating.  In the later case I have tried to amend the problem where it occurs but more often than not the relocated characters are simply omitted.  Also, I cannot vouch for the paragraph structure.  Correcting these problems would require access to the printed copies of Fears' books.  Alas, but this is beyond my reach.

This page allows the reader to search for entries based on a range of dates.  The entries are also accessible from each of the primary sections (Epochs, Episodes and Chapters) of Twain's Geography.  

Entry Date (field_entry_date)

June 7, 1883 Thursday

June 7 Thursday – Sam gave a reading at the Decorative Art Society, home of Mrs. Franklin Whitmore, Farmington Avenue, Hartford. According to the Hartford CourantJune 8 p.2, “City Briefs,” there were a series of readings from Sam’s writings to about 150 members and friends.

June 8, 1883 Friday

June 8 Friday – Clara Clemens’ ninth birthday. Sam noted amusement at Clara’s efforts to understand his penciled comment on the flyleaf of John Abbott’s (1805-1877) Daniel Boone: “A poor slovenly book; a mess of sappy drivel & bad grammar” [Gribben 4].

June 12, 1883 Tuesday 

June 12 Tuesday – Henry Allaway wrote from New Haven, clipping enclosed from the NY Evening Telegram of June 11 about Capt. Charles C. Duncan planning to take “legal action” for remarks Sam reportedly said to the NY Times. Allaway asked if he might come to Hartford and “allow me to bore you once more in getting the point for a gossipy article about your career?” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “The Interviewer"

June 13, 1883 Wednesday

June 13 Wednesday – Susy and Clara Clemens wrote to Mr. Francis Parsons in Elmira that they would “be happy to see” him “Tuesday afternoon” June 26 “From 4 until 8.” The note does not appear to be in a child’s hand, although Susy was twelve [MTP].

June 14, 1883 Thursday

June 14 Thursday  The Clemens family left Hartford and arrived in New York [MTBus 214].

Worden & Co. Wrote having rec’d his of June 13 and enclosing a memo of the sale of 100 shares MoPac and orders from Dean Sage to sell the remaining 200 shares [MTP]. Note: Sage acted as Sam’s stock broker from NY.

June 15, 1883 Friday 

June 15 Friday  The Clemens family left New York City and traveled by special sleeping car to Elmira [MTBus 214].

Twichell noted in his journal, “our eighth child and fourth son was b. about 11 AM” [Yale, copy at MTP]. The boy was named Joseph Hooker Twichell.

Joe Twichell wrote to Livy with news of #8—a son—Joseph Hooker Twichell [MTP].

June 17, 1883 Sunday 

June 17 Sunday – Under the headline “ENGLISH BADLY FLAYED” The New York Times, p.10 ran an article about Sam’s introduction to The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English by J. Osgood & Co.

June 18, 1883 Monday

June 18 Monday  Sam wrote from Elmira to Charles Webster. Sam anticipated a suit about the “strawberries interview” about Duncan, and directed Charley not to say anything to George Jones  (1811-1891), one of the founders of the New York Times.

June 19, 1883 Tuesday 

June 19 Tuesday – Noah Brooks wrote that he’d been subpoenaed on behalf of the prosecution in Duncan’s suit, but that he knew nothing. “I wish you could get the case removed from Brooklyn. That is a bad place for you; Duncan will have things fixed to suit him” [MTP].

June 23, 1883 Saturday 

June 23 Saturday – The New York Times reported that Sam was staying at the Hotel Brunswick [“PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE,” p8]. When Sam went to the City after June 20 and how long he stayed has not yet been pinned down, but newspaper reports in the Times generally fell a day later than his first night’s stay, which would make his arrival in the city Friday, June 22.

June 27, 1883 Wednesday

June 27 Wednesday – Bissell & Co. per George H. Burt wrote, “If present appearance are correct you are overdrawn $1662.73 we will send the usual statement the 1st prox” [MTP].

Richard L. Ogden finished his June 26 letter [MTP].

June 28, 1883 Thursday

June 28 Thursday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Charles Webster, who evidently had passed the idea of travel to California to invest in vineyards. Joe Goodman was involved in vineyards but he isn’t mentioned in this letter, although Samuel Webster writes that Goodman may have inspired the interest in vineyards [217]. Sam answered that no way should Webster go to “all that trouble for a thousand vineyards…The idea of you going to California to find a wa

June 29, 1883 Friday

June 29 Friday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Charles Webster.

“All right. I will wait till Duncan goes for me individually before I bother. I guess he will not see his way to tackling me at all if Whitford gives his lawyer a hint of what my defense would be.”

July 1883

July – Sam invented the English history game with pegs up the Quarry Farm driveway for different years from 1066. He then made the commercial board game and involved Charles Webster.

This was also a period of continuous outpouring of productivity in Sam’s writing, especially on the HF manuscript. Howells returned from a year in Europe and collaborated with Sam on several stage play projects. The next eighteen months were quite productive for both men.

July 2, 1883 Monday

July 2 Monday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Karl & Hattie Gerhardt. He was hard at work on Huck:

“We have been here on the hill a week or more & I am deep in my work & grinding out manuscript by the acre—stick to it the whole day long, allowing myself only time to scratch off two or three brief letters after they yell for me to come down to supper” [MTP].