Stormfield - Day By Day

January 27 Thursday — In Hamilton, Bermuda Sam wrote to Albert B. Paine in Redding, Conn.

January 28 Thursday – Sam was in New York City.; In Redding, Conn., Mary L. Howden (“Miss Mollie”) wrote for Sam to Mrs. L.T. Guilford.

1) Dear Madam X and to say that as many ladies have written papers on him for their [lunch societies for many years past it is not necessary for him to grant permission. He wishes me to say that he would [ be glad to answer your letter with his own hand but that the mail is so voluminous that it is ] ] impossible for him to attend to any of it personally [MTP]. SEE below:

January 28 Friday — Albert Bigelow Paine wrote from Redding to Clemens:

I will forward our letter to the Poet Moroso. It will gratify him very much—more than any money payment he could receive, I am sure.

I am enclosing you an interesting batch best of all a letter from Clara, written eleven days ago. Perhaps she has one on the way to you, too—of course she has—but you will be glad to see this, no doubt. I’d like to have it again, by and by,

January 29 Friday – Sam was in New York City and enjoyed a birthday dinner party for H.H. Rogers, “a pretty large one, for it is a big family when they all get together” [Jan. 31 to Sturgis]. Note: this would be HHR’s last birthday.

In Redding, Conn., Mary L. Howden (“Miss Mollie”) wrote for Sam to an unidentified woman. Jan 29.

January 29 Saturday — Sam finished his Jan. 26 to Elizabeth Wallace.

January 3 Sunday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Margaret Blackmer at the Misses Tewksbury’s School, Washington-on-Hudson, N.Y.

January 3 Monday - Albert B. Paine wrote to William H. Allen in Bermuda, advising them of Sam’s preferences during his stay there. Paine’s protectiveness of Clemens is quite evident:

For Mr. Clemens, I want to say that he is more than anxious to go to your house [Bay House] during his stay in Bermuda, for he does not like hotel life... but he feels he could not take advantage of this generosity on your part for any length of time without some compensation....

January 30 Saturday – In the evening Sam returned to Redding, Conn. from N.Y.C. after a ten day visit [Jan. 31 to Sturgis].

Sam’s brief article, “The New Planet” ran in Harper’s Weekly. Hill calls it “uninspired” [218].  

Sara Lippman wrote from Phila. to ask if she might send one of his books for his autograph [MTP].

Charles P.G. Scott for the Simplified Spelling Board sent a printed “Call For Third Annual Meeting, April 6 and 7, 1909” [MTP].

January 30 Sunday — In Hamilton, Bermuda Sam wrote to Thomas Lemuel James (1831-1916), prior Postmaster General briefly under Garfield (1881-1882); afterward until his death James was chairman of the board of directors of the Lincoln National Bank, NYC . See also Feb. 15 entry.

Dear General—

Please send me fifty dollars. Send it in silver American quarter pieces. Don’t send old rusty ones. Send bright and white and new ones just out of the mint. I have a special use for them. I enclose a check.

Sincerely yours,

January 31 Sunday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Dorothy Sturgis.

My dear Annieanlouise—

I have been in New York ten days, visiting friends, & got back home with some guests yesterday evening by the light of the fresh snow, no lanterns being needed & none displayed either at the front door or in the loggia. So the days are really lengthening, & I am so glad!

January 31 Monday — In Hamilton, Bermuda Sam inscribed a copy of “Is Shakespeare Dead?” From My Autobiography to Marion S, Allen (Mrs. William H. Allen). “We ought never to break the Sabbath during a thunderstorm. /Truly Yours /Mark Twain / To / Mrs. William Allen / with the respect, esteem, and affectionate regards of / The Author” [MTP].

Albert Bigelow Paine wrote from Redding to Clemens:

January 4 Monday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to the Telephone Operators.

To the Young Ladies of the Telephone Office:

I have received your kind & welcome notes, & I thank you for them, & wish you a happy New year, with many & many others to follow.

Your obliged & appreciative friend Mark Twain  [MTP]. Note: Sam sent each operator a box of candy.

Sam also wrote on The Educational Theatre for Children letterhead, to an unidentified man.

January 4 Tuesday — D. Hoffman writes: “Clemens took the train to New York on Tuesday, January 4, and had dinner that night with Howells and Paine at the home of Edward Eugene Loomis, who was married to Livy’s niece, Julia O. Langdon” [144]. (Editorial emphasis.) Note: it would be the last time Howells and Clemens met. Though the date is off by one day, MTHL carries the following note: 

January 5 Tuesday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote a three-paragraph letter (again on the Children’s Theatre letterhead) to an unidentified  person, inviting to a course of lectures at the Lyceum Theatre [MTP: Cordelia and Tom Platt catalogs, Nov. 1993, Item 1F]. Note: like the Jan. 4 letter this and likely several others were sent out to promote “the dramatic instinct in education.”

January 5 Wednesday — Sam sailed “unexpectedly” for Bermuda on the Bermudian. Paine did not accompany him; instead his valet, Claude Benchotte [Paine to Quick Jan 17; D. Hoffman 158]. Note: Paine also had written the Allens that Sam would likely make another trip during the winter to Bermuda; Sam, down with a cold on New Year’s Day, planned to leave on this day for Bermuda, so just how “unexpected” the trip was, it may have seemed so to Paine.

January 6 Wednesday – Anna L. Cunningham wrote to thank Sam for the box of chocolates [MTP]. Note: “Telephone girl”

January 6 Thursday — Sam was at sea on the Bermudian headed for Bermuda. It would be his last stay there and last 95 days, his longest [D. Hoffman 158].

Albert Bigelow Paine wrote from Redding to Clemens: “Matters are going well. Mrs. Paine & I are sending out the cards, and I shall order two hundred more bought. Already there are over three hundred letters and telegrams and a number came in today—one from Helen Keller, which I enclose to you” [MTP].

January 7 Thursday – Sam’s new guestbook:           

Name Address Date Remarks

H.W. Dearborn [signed]    [New York]  Jan. 7

Ragnvald Blix began a letter to Sam that he finished Jan. 21 [MTP]. Note: not found at MTP.

January 7 Friday — Sam arrived in Hamilton, Bermuda, where he wrote from the Allen’s Bay House, Pembroke Parish, to Frederick A. Duneka or Frederick T. Leigh at Harper’s.

Dear Duneka 
or The Major: 
Please get for me with good dispatch, & send to me to the above address, these things, to-wit, and charge to me: 
“Old Rose & Silver,” by Myrtle Reed; 
“Their Heart’s Desire” (illustrated by Harrison Fisher;) 
“The Master’s Violin.” hy Myrtle Reed

January 8 Friday – John Albert Macy brought galleys of Some Acrostic Signatures of Francis Bacon, etc. (1909) by William Stone Booth (1864-1926) . Sam then wrote the first pages of “Is Shakespeare Dead?”  Sam thereby became convinced that “Booth, had demonstrated, beyond any doubt or question, that the Bacon signatures were there” (in Shakespeare’s works) [Gribben 77; MTB 1479, 1485-6].

Sam’s new guestbook:  

Name Address Date Remarks

Annie S. Macy

January 8 Saturday — Amy C. Hayes wrote from Molokai, Hawaii to offer condolences from her and her son, Dr. Homer H. Hayes [MTP].

January 9 Saturday – The Armstrong Assoc. of New York, per May Hurlburt sent Sam tickets for a box at Carnegie Hall on Jan. 22 [MTP].

Diana Belais, President of the New York Anti-Vivisection Society wrote to ask Sam for a letter of introduction to Harpers, as they were in “a terrific fight …against the Medical Society of New York, which has banded indissolubly to crush out our movement” [MTP].

January 9 Sunday — Albert Bigelow Paine wrote from Redding to Clemens:

I am enclosing to you a letter from Clara, received yesterday. It seems to be postmarked the 27th, so it was written before she could have received a letter from you.

She probably received my first letter about Jan 1 and we may expect an answer to it by next steamer. I also am enclosing a letter from Margaret Blackmer and I will put in one or two foreign letters [MTP].

Margaret W. Patterson wrote from Iowa to offer condolences [MTP].

July 1 Wednesday – Sam and Albert B. Paine were still in Boston at the Hotel Touraine, staying the third night there [July 5 to Sturgis]. According to Paine:

Clemens did not wish to hurry in the summer heat, and we remained another day quietly sight- seeing, and driving around and around Commonwealth Avenue in a victoria in the cool of the evening. Once, remembering Aldrich, he said:

July 1 Thursday — The Mark Twain Library Association held another lawn party to raise funds at the home of Harry A. Lounsbury. The minutes reveal “not a very large attendance, but the profit was pleasing,” It is not known if Clemens attended [MTLA minutes copied by Tenney Nov. 15, 1981].

Emma Falkner wrote from Regents Park, England to sell Dr. Samuel Johnson's Dictionary [MTP].