May 16 Thursday – John Henry Riley wrote to Sam: “Yours of Cleveland 13th inst. is recd today. I have managed to pass over my birthday (15th inst.) which is usually a turning point in my affairs. I am now taking electro-galvanic application with the view of arresting the progress of the disease and Dr. Grier expressed himself satisfied with the result of the first application” [MTP].
Elmira, Hartford and England: Day By Day
May 16 Friday – Mrs. Fairbanks, Livy and Clara Spaulding spent the night in Livy’s cabin on the Batavia, while Sam stayed at the St. Nicholas Hotel [MTL 5: 366n1].
May 16 Saturday – Sam purchased Francois Pierre Guizot’s (1787-1874) A Popular History of France from Estes & Lauriat of Boston. The work was sent in segments and totaled $10 [Gribben 282].
May 17 Wednesday – Elisha Bliss replied to Sam’s May 15.
Your favor recd. Am glad to hear from you. Sorry to hear you are not going to call on us to day. However it may be for the best as I think you are in the mood to do good work, at which I heartily rejoice—
Glad to know you are so pressed with overtures for work.
May 17 Friday – Livy and Sam wrote from Elmira to niece Annie E. Moffett. Livy sent some silk material for Annie to use and Sam denied newspaper reports that he’d made a fortune off his two books and lectures. “So you see we are not nearly so rich as the papers think we are” [MTL 5: 92].
Orion Clemens wrote a long reply to Sam’s May 15 about a possible lawsuit against Elisha Bliss.
May 17 Saturday – Livy and Sam wrote onboard the SS Batavia to Olivia Lewis Langdon. The ship pulled away from the New York harbor in the morning. Livy wrote that Mrs. Fairbanks had just left them and that Livy’s friend Fidele Brooks also visited. Accompanying the party was Samuel C. Thompson, who was to be Sam’s secretary to take dictation using the method of shorthand he’d been teaching.
May 18 Saturday – Screamers, a small collection of Mark Twain’s stories published without Sam’s full approval, was reviewed in the London Spectator. Welland writes and quotes from the review:
May 18 Monday – Sam boarded a train for New York. He arrived at 9 PM and stayed one night at the Astor House. He may have wanted to meet with the matinee idol Lawrence Barrett, who checked into the hotel the day before. John T. Raymond was also in New York, staying at the New York Hotel close by the Astor.
May – Sam’s article, “The Old-Time Pony Express of the Great Plains” ran in American Publisher, an in-house promotional pamphlet of the American Publishing Co [Camfield, bibliog.].
May – The Cape Monthly Magazine, Cape Town, South Africa, edited by Prof. Roderick Noble, ran a section (p. 295-360) reviewing IA and quoting many passages from the recently released book [Google books for Cape Monthly Magazine, July 2009; not in Tenney].
May, early – Joe Goodman, then living in San Francisco, attended a play, an adaptation of The Gilded Age, by Gilbert B. Densmore (sometimes misidentified as G.S. Densmore). Joe sent Sam a clipping on the production [Walker, Phillip 185].
May, mid – Sam wrote to the matinee idol actor, Lawrence Barrett (1838-1891), offering him the role of Colonel Mulberry Sellers in his Gilded Age play. He also solicited Barrett’s opinion of actors Frank Mayo and John T. Raymond (John O’Brien 1836-1887), who had appeared in Densmore’s San Francisco version [MTL 6: 148]. Raymond eventually starred in Sam’s play.
May 19 Monday – The New York Supreme Court Chief Justice George L. Ingraham (1847-1930) granted Clemens a temporary injunction against Benjamin J. Such [MTL 5: 370n5]. Sam’s attorney was Simon Sterne [NY Times, June 11, 1873 p.2].
May 19 Tuesday – Sam returned to Elmira in the morning [MTL 6: 149 letter to Seaver].
May 2 Tuesday – In Elmira, Sam wrote to James Redpath:
Indeed I would like to find that Canadian “Innocents” if you can get it.
I am well & flourishing & hard at work on a book similar to the “Innocents” but my wife is still confined to her bed & has been over three months / Yours / Clemens [MTP, drop-in letters].
May 2 Saturday – Bill paid to Hartford Ice Company 5,750lbs. $23 [MTP]. Judging from earlier bills, the Clemens family went through this amount of ice every six months or so.
An $5,000 insurance policy was written to the Atlas Ins. Co., Hartford, for a term of one month, on the “brick dwelling in process of erection on Farmington Ave.” [MTP].
May 20 Monday – Sam wrote “a hasty note” from Elmira to Mollie Clemens to hire a cook who had been referred, to put a cot in Sam’s study and that they would start home “about Thursday or Friday noon. Will telegraph” [MTL 5: 93].
May 20 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Elmira to William A. Seaver, editor of Harper’s. Sam apologized for not stopping by on his one-day foray to New York, but would run through New York on the way to Hartford “by & by” and “then I propose to assemble where there be refreshments, & tackle you” [MTL 6: 149-50].
May 21 Tuesday – Bill paid to Horace C. Deming, flour & grain dealer, for $11.40 [MTP].
May 21 Thursday – Sam wrote from Elmira for a certificate of copyright from Ainsworth R. Spofford, librarian of Congress. Sam enclosed fractional paper currency for fifty cents [MTL 6: 150].
May 22 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Orion and Mollie, about being delayed by having only one nurse and needing a few days to secure another [MTL 5: 94].
May 22–29 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Elmira during this period to William Dean Howells, thanking him for the “satisfactory notice of ‘Roughing It’” in the Atlantic. Here is where Sam made his famous remark:
May 22 Friday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Elisha Bliss. Sam had been trying to expedite a book between Edward H. House in Japan and Bliss. Sam asked for a copy of Bliss’ last letter about the Japan book for Sam to send to House.
May 23 Saturday – Sam’s cashbook: “To po Potter Architect [Edward T. Potter] 500.00” [Berg, NYPL].
May 25 Monday – Lawrence Barrett, well known actor, wrote responding to Sam’s mid-May request (not extant) for his offer to play the role of Col. Sellers, or to recommend someone. Barrett, who had met Sam years before in San Francisco, recommended John T. Raymond for the role [MTL 6: 148]. Note: see full text of Barrett’s letter in source; it’s undetermined just when Clemens and Barrett met in S.F.
May 26 Friday – Harriet P. Spofford wrote to Sam [MTP].
© 2025 Twain's Geography, All rights reserved.