The Twainian, Volume 20 Number 6 (1961)
Mark Twain’s Visit to Geneseo, New York
We are making a further attempt in this issue of the Twainian to illustrate what we desired our members to do for their Foundation, to discover and report any and all items which add to our knowledge about Twain. Such is the story “Mark Twain’s Visit to Geneseo” written by Gary W. LaVigne, a student in the State University College of Education and sent to us by Walter Harding, Chairman of the English Department. Incidentally Walter is Secretary of the “Thoreau Society” and edits a bulletin for their members.
THE DAY MARK TWAIN CAME TO GENESEO, NEW YORK
By Gary W. LaVigne
This paper is the culmination of many hopes and disappointments, and of just as many great anticipations. It seems incredible that one researcher could have encountered so many obstacles. My first disappointment was the discovery that six months of the local paper is missing from the files. I’m not sure if fire was the reason or not, but when, do you suppose, these papers were from? They were the last newspapers of 1868, and the first four months of 1869. Incidentally, Mark Twain came here on March 1, 1869. To add to this disappointment the anticipated minutes of the Young Men’s Association Meetings are not available. Certainly, there are minutes before 1869 and for many years after 1869. Mark Twain kept a notebook of things that happened to him and little interesting observations that he had made. Well, he stopped writing in his notebook in 1868 and did not resume until 1877. These are a few of the many strokes of bad luck that were encountered.
There was, in the village of Geneseo, an elegant school, named for its grounds, Temple Hill Academy. Although many of its students were local residents, the school claimed President Chester A. Arthur, Governor Washington Hunt, and Japanese Field Marshal Uyama among its graduates. The enrollment of the school was roughly 150 students and it was here in this institution that the seed of our story was planted.
Among the various activities of the school, was a club for men called, The Young Men’s Association. This group sponsored many extra-curricular programs, all intended to benefit the students and the inhabitants of the area. Their major work was in engaging prominent lecturers of the time to speak in Geneseo. Their members would sell season tickets for five dollars or single tickets for fifty cents. It seems that the “Young Men” had a particular interest in the fairer sex, as we can see by their 1869 lecture series which included Olive Logan on “Girls,” R. L. Collier on “Women For The Period,” and Wirt Sikes on “After Dark in New York.”
It was at a meeting of the Young Men’s Association in the latter part of 1868 that the suggestion of trying to bring Mark Twain to Geneseo was first heard. Evidently, it was well received and the young men voted “yes” to the proposal.
At about this time, Mark Twain was setting a very fast pace for himself on a lecture tour. His fame as a comic lecturer and as author of the recent best seller The Innocents Abroad was bringing him more money than literary prestige. He lectured in a very large number of cities and towns during the season of 1868-1869, under contract with a Mr. James Redpath, who was proprietor of the Boston Lyceum Bureau, offering his new lecture entitled, “The Vandal Abroad.” This talk was later called “The American Vandal,” or “The American Vandal Abroad.” For each lecture, he was earning one hundred dollars or more a night and making most nights count.
It is evident that although Mark Twain was enthusiastically received wherever he went and despite the fact that he was a natural showman, by January 1869, he was growing weary of the schedule of appearances he had set for himself. In a letter to his sister Pamela he wrote that he was “getting awfully tired of it. I spend about half as much money as I make, I think, though I have managed to save about a thousand more.” When Mark Twain wrote this, he was deeply in love with Olivia Langdon of Elmira, New York, and was intent on saving enough money to buy into a newspaper. He had been on the staff of the New York Tribune, writing syndicated columns, but he wanted to head and write for his own paper. It was about January of 1869 that he told the Young Men’s Association of Geneseo he would give a lecture on February 25th of that year.
The Young Men’s Association, having received Mark Twain's reply, set to work announcing the lecture and anticipating a great reception. This announcement appeared in the Geneseo Valley Herald:
Y.M.A. Lecture—It has been definitely ascertained that the great humorist, Mark Twain, will lecture before the Young Men’s Association of Geneseo, at Concert Hall, on Thursday evening of next week, Feb. 18th. As to the ability of this lecturer to entertain an audience we need say nothing, for he is known far and wide as a man that deals in real, genuine wit and humor, mingled with bits of sarcasm that are trite and truthful. His writings are free from obscenity or vulgarity, and give unmistakable evidence of his ability to amuse and instruct his hearers. Great praise is due the Young Men’s Association for the energy displayed in securing good lectures, and we hope our citizens will show their appreciation by a liberal purchase of tickets. It is not the desire of the Y.M.A., to make money out of their lecturers, but merely wish receipts sufficient to meet all expenses. They do not ask for donations; but they will amply repay for the price of admission. We promise to all an interesting and agreeable time, next week Thursday evening. Tickets of admission can be obtained at the Book Stores and the door. Price 50 cents.
The association put up notices like the one below, as another means of advertising:
Y.M.A.
The Young Men's Association of Geneseo have the pleasure to announce that
THE GREAT HUMORIST MARK TWAIN
will deliver a lecture
THURSDAY EVENING
FEB. 18, 1869
at Concert Hall, Geneseo
Subject.......American Vandals in the Old World.
Tickets, 50 cents
To Be had at the Book Stores and at the Door
By Order Com.
The backers of the project were evidently attending to all types of advertising. The following bit of news shows how they got newspaper coverage of the lecture. “Mark Twain lectures at Geneseo on Thursday evening February 25th before the Young Men’s Lecture Association. He is a popular lecturer and will draw a large house. We acknowledge the receipt of complimentaries.”
It is interesting to note what Mark Twain’s contemporaries thought of him. The people in the Geneseo area were doubtless awaiting his arrival, but with what attitudes or preconceptions did they view this man? The following article fills us in on what one writer in the neighborhood thought.
Mr. Samuel L. Clemens, “Mark Twain,” is to lecture in Geneseo, this evening on “American Vandals in the Old World.” Those of our readers who remember Twain’s history of Joseph, which he published some time since, will not need to be told that this lecture will be one of the most entertaining, ever delivered. Says the Livingston Republican last week:
Mark Twain is among the first of our humorous writers. Unlike Nasby, with whom he is sometimes compared, his humor is genuine, refined and pleasing.
Nasby deals in sarcasm, irony, keen cutting wit, and not always does he clothe his utterance in choice language, but sometimes writes that which is coarse, vulgar and repugnant to cultivated and refined ears. On the contrary, Mark Twain’s writings contain nothing repulsive to the most fastidious while they are filled with broad, genial good humor. They please all and cause pain to none. In “American Vandals in the Old World,” he has outdone himself and produced a lecture at once popular, pleasing and instructive, and one which he has delivered to crowded houses in all our principal cities.
We regret that we did not receive notice of this lecture in time to inform our readers of the same last week and we advise all of them who read this notice today to attend the lecture if possible. It will repay a long journey and some expense, and our Geneseo neighbors are entitled to a rich reward for their enterprise in this direction.
It certainly looked as if this lecture was going to be the crowning success of the year. The people of the village had planned quite a celebration to accompany the lecture and indications are that people from far and wide expected Mark Twain to be on his way.
Then came the blow! Twain had scheduled a number of appearances in New York and Pennsylvania, but would easily have made Geneséo on February 18 had it not been for Mr. Fairbanks, husband of a very dear friend of Twain’s, who had committed him to a lecture and had not informed him until it was too late to back out. For this reason, it was physically impossible for Twain to arrive in Geneseo on the appointed day. Instead, he sent telegram regretting his absence, and proceeded to Elmira, where he proposed and became engaged to Livy Langdon.
At 10 o’clock, the morning of the lecture, the members of the Y.M.A. were busily at work decorating and making final arrangements for Twain’s arrival when his telegram arrived. It said that he was “unavoidably detained” and could not reach Geneseo that evening. After weeks of advertising, very much planning and anticipation, the news was very disheartening. The Y.M.A. gave one last try and telegraphed back that they would cover expenses if he could possibly manage to find a way to get here, but it was of no avail.
It was impossible to spread the word of the cancellation to all ticket holders because many lived in the surrounding countryside. The Rochester Daily Chronicle tells us what was done about the situation:
A large number of persons from the country had come into the village intending to be present at the lecture, The “Young men” under whose auspices it was to have been delivered had caused an elegant entertainment to be prepared at the American Hotel in honor of “Mark,” but his absence did not prevent that part of the program from being carried out. A large company sat down to tables about 10 o'clock in the evening, and several hours were spent in gustatory and social enjoyments. The young men of Geneseo have an admirable knack of getting up such affairs and making them pleasant to the participants.
Indeed, the Y.M.A., did not give up hope of bringing Twain to Geneseo. They telegraphed him in Elmira and the cheering news was received that he would positively lecture here on Monday, March 1st. They also asked him if he should be advertised immediately. His answer was, “Advertise liberally and without fear.”
Twain followed his telegram with a letter in which he said he was exceedingly sorry that he had caused the disappointment, and added that he truly desired to lecture before the people on March 1st. We have a clearer picture of how Twain viewed the situation in a letter to Mrs. Fairbanks, his old friend. “I telegraphed them to stop the lecture (in Geneseo) send my bill, which they did. I said (paid?’ it—$22.25. Now, I have to go to Geneseo at last to satisfy those people.”
After Twain confirmed the new lecture date the local papers again began the campaign of publicizing the event. The fact that this would be his second lecture date, gave at least two would-be-clever newspaper reporters a chance to show their stuff. One wrote, “Another engagement has been made with him, and it is certain that he will not mark twain disappointments in this section.” Another proudly proclaimed, “If one appointment would not fetch him, twain will.”
The days progressed, one by one, with renewed cries of “Don’t fail to go and hear him” and “Go early and get a good seat” facing the reader of the weekly newspapers, until at long last that wonderful day arrived. The only record of the events of that day are written by Twain and quaintly woven into a love letter to his beloved Livy. He related that:
Half a dozen young gentlemen (of Charlie’s) (Livy’s brother) 20 to 25 years of age, received me at the depot with a handsome open sleigh and drove me to the hotel (The American Hotel) in style—and then took possession of my room and invited a dozen more in, and ordered cigars, and made themselves entirely happy and contented. But they were hard to entertain, for they took me for a lion. I had to carry the bulk of the conversation myself, which is a thing that presently grows wearisome. At dinner I begged off from going sleigh-riding, and said I wanted to go to bed in about an hour. After dinner they came up again. Pretty soon I spoke once more of retiring. It produced no effect. Then I rose and said, “Boys, I shall have to bid you a good-afternoon, for I am stupid and sleepy — and you must pardon my bluntness, but I must go to bed.” Poor fellows, they were stricken speechless — they looked mortified, and went blundering out like a flock of sheep, treading on each other’s heels in their confusion. I undressed and went to bed, and tried to go to sleep — but again and again my conscience smote me — again and again I thought of how mean and how shameful a return I had made for their well-meant and whole-hearted friendliness to me a stranger within their gates — and how puppyish it was in me to be angered instead of gladdened by that gushing cordiality of youth, a thing which ought to have won me by its very naivete and its rare honesty. And then I said to myself, I'll make amends for this — and so got up and dressed and gave the boys all of my time til midnight — and also from this noon til I left at four this afternoon. And so, if any man is thoroughly popular with the young people of Geneseo today, it is I.
To be sure Twain did take his leave of the boys to deliver his famous talk, “American Vandals in the Old World.” No doubt, he was taken by sleigh to Concert Hall on Main Street where all of the lecturers in the series, were to speak. Concert Hall was built in 1851 to accommodate sixty settees and some chairs so that approximately five hundred people could be seated.
I have been unable to find the complete text of the lecture given by Twain at Concert Hall and a recent writer on the topic, Paul Fatout of Purdue University, states:
So far as I know, no manuscript of Mark Twain's “American Vandal Abroad,” exists From excerpts in various papers however, it seems plain that it was mostly made up of material that went into The Innocents Abroad. Some parts, such as the apostrophe to the Sphinx, he evidently gave just about as they appear in the book. Some of the time anyhow, for the indications are that he continually varied his talks.
One of the favorite delights of the 1800’s, and indeed, even today, was to listen to a traveler relive his journey. You can probably imagine such a narration, but can you do it when that traveler is Mark Twain? It is no wonder that The Innocents Abroad and the author’s talks on the book were so successful. In telling us what he saw, he exaggerates, pokes fun at the natives, disregards tradition for utility and practicality, is sometimes serious and objective but most of the time very humorous. He alternates from beautiful description to skepticism and sarcasm. He shows deep disgust with certain ignorant and backward elements and the same for the pomposity and arrogance of noblemen and aristocrats. At times, while reading certain excursions in The Innocents Abroad. I could not keep myself from laughing aloud. For instance, when he was climbing Mount Vesuvius on a mule, he was very annoyed at a vagrant who pretended to be driving the animal, but was, instead, being pulled by it. When they had reached a point where Mark gives a beautiful description of the valley below, he climaxes it by saying:
About this time, the fellow who was hanging to the tail of the horse in front of me and practicing all sorts of unnecessary cruelty upon the animal, got kicked some fourteen rods, and this incident, together with the fairy spectacle of the lights far in the distance, made me serenely happy.
Material such as that being the content, the only thing needed to make the performance completely side-splitting would be Twain’s delivery. Mr. Noah Brooks gives us a vivid picture in words of our gallant speaker on the platform.
His method as a lecturer was distinctly, unique and novel. His slow deliberate drawl, the anxious and perturbed expression on his visage, the apparently painful effort with which he framed his sentences, the surprise that spread over his face when the audience roared with delight or rapturously applauded the finer passages of his word-painting were unlike anything of the kind they had ever known.
All in all, the performance was, undoubtedly, a great success.
Here ought to be entered a plentiful number of reviews of the lecture, but, unfortunately, the papers were so full of President Grant and the election returns that not a word can be found about Mark Twain. A few weeks after the lecture, the Y.M.A. sponsored a talk by a clergyman and very few were on hand to hear it. What followed was this interesting article which, after reprimanding the readers, said:
The next lecture will be delivered by the great Nasby, who will undoubtedly draw a large audience, as did Mark Twain. This shows, what we are sorry to see, that the majority of our people desire humorous lecturers, and will not turn out to hear a sound, able exposition of ideas, or a beautiful description of the country and scenery which has been seen by some traveler. Nonsense and not sense is what they want. If this is so, we have no doubt that the Y.M.A., in arranging their course for next year, will gratify them by engaging none but humorous lecturers. It may be a good idea to engage a minstrel troupe, also. Humorous and witty lecturers are good to listen to and probably no one likes to hear them better than we: but we don’t like too much of a good thing, any more than did the cat when she fell into the pail of milk.
With the lecture over, Twain was escorted back to the hotel where the Geneseo boys and some from The Wesleyan College at Lima, put the finishing touches on the evening. Twain wrote:
The whole tribe came to the hotel after the lecture, and entertained me with vocal and piano music in the parlor, and with cider and whole worlds of tobacco smoke — but they drank a little of everything, and music which you might have heard a mile. I played sedate old gentleman, but never reproved them once, for I couldn’t help saying to myself, you'll be all the better men for sowing your wild oats while you are young — I'll go your security. They assembled in the street before the hotel, shortly after I had retired, and gave me three terrific cheers — which was rather more honor than I desired.
Having brought something exciting to the people of the Geneseo country, Mark Twain departed by train enroute to Rochester and then to Lockport for his next appearance.
Not much is left of those memories after almost a hundred years. The American Hotel burned in the 1870's, Temple Hill Academy and Young Men’s Association dissolved about that same time, Concert Hall is vacant, decaying, and condemned, the railroad ceases to rumble near the town and even if we did have a cutter, it would be astonishing if we had more than March slush to glide it over. Not a soul, to my knowledge, can recall an ancestor’s telling of the glorious day when Mark Twain came to Geneseo.