Home at Hartford: Day By Day

April 1 Thursday – Sam and Livy wrote from Hartford to William Dean Howells.

April 1 Friday – Bills/Receipts/Statements from Hartford merchants:

April 1 Saturday – Schwartz Bros., New York (soon to be F.A.O. Schwartz) billed Sam $22.25 for Feb. 17, 18, Mar. 17; “dolls, bow, doll beds & bedding, 1 doz arrows, 2 pr skates 4.50; 1 pr skates” [MTP].

Park & Tilford, New York, billed Sam $5 for Mar. 16 purchase “10 Ool tea” (other bills spell this out as oolong tea); paid Apr. 9 [MTP].

April 1 Sunday – Mollie and Orion Clemens wrote to Sam & Livy. Orion thanked Sam for the German books sent. They’d written to Kate Lampton to visit when it turned warmer and that Ma would send her tickets both ways. Sorry to hear of Livy’s “danger” but were glad she was better. Mollie urged them to visit [MTP].

April 1 Tuesday – George W. Cable, in a stunt “to pay off his debt of gratitude for his recent entertainment in the Clemens’s home,” [MTB 768-70] arranged for 150 friends of Sam’s to write him on April Fool’s Day requesting his autograph.

April 1 Wednesday – Sam’s Mar. 28 letter to Frank A. Nichols ran in the New York World. It was widely copied in other papers [MTHL 2: 526n2].

In Hartford, Sam wrote to an unidentified lady who had asked if he might send his short tribute to Adam. Sam replied positively and sent her a paragraph from Innocents Abroad [MTP].

April 1 Friday – A new contract between Charles Webster, Samuel L. Clemens and Frederick J. Hall was dated April 1, 1887. It called for the following: Sam would keep $75,000 in the firm; Webster’s salary would be increased to $3,800, an increase of $800; Hall was given the annual salary of $2,000 and also one-twentieth of the net profits, with Sam and Webster dividing the remaining profits, two-thirds and one-third [MTLTP 230n2].

April 1 Sunday – Sam allowed a line about Lorenz Reich’s wine from a Dec. 2, 1882 letter to be quoted in a New York Times article, p.5, “A HOTEL OF HOMES,” about The Cambridge Hotel, which was novel due to its “modern apartment” accommodations.

April 1 Monday –Sam returned to Hartford in time to give a reading at “Lib” Hamersley’s, including “Encounter with an Interviewer,” “The Skinned Man,” selections from HF and the Jumping Frog [MTNJ 3: 446; Fatout, MT Speaking 659]. Note: This reading was originally scheduled for Apr. 2 but was changed by Ellen T. Johnson in her Mar. 8 letter. Sam later noted to send thanks for the roses he was given for this event [MTNJ 3: 469n217]. 

April 1 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam responded to William Dean Howells’ Mar. 26 letter about A.P. Burbank wanting payment to release rights to the American Claimant play. There would be time enough to talk business with the man later, Sam thought.

April 1 Wednesday – Frederick J. Hall wrote a long letter and a short letter to Sam. The shortie was enclosed with a proof set of the Mark Twain’s Memory Builder game for his approval. The long letter dealt with Watson Gill feeling “pretty sore” about the fact that Webster & Co. was now doing business that used to be sent to Gill, who would threaten to appeal to Sam on each dispute. The current argument was over 70 or 80 of the Sheridan books sent to Gill that were damanged after lying on the dock at Stoningham, Conn.

April 10 Saturday – The Chicago Tribune was among the first to review A Tramp Abroad:

Mark Twain has finished another book. As he has been silent for some time possibly the book also finished him….A Tramp Abroad, while interesting reading, and in parts exhibiting much of the humor which gave fame to its author in The Innocents Abroad, is inferior to the latter in some of the qualifications which made that book so unusually successful (“Literature” p9) [Budd, Reviews 183].

April 10 Sunday – Karl Gerhardt wrote from Paris to Sam and Livy about his entrance into and positive experience in the Ecole des Beaux Arts [MTP].

Joe Goodman wrote from Fresno to Clemens.

April 10 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to reply to the Apr. 6 compliments from Rutherford B. Hayes, who had expressed a “happy reception” for P&P at his house. After explaining the receipt of his letter came just when their dinner friends were discussing the potential greatness of the Hayes administration (to Sam another example of “Mental Telegraphy”),  and being “deeply gratified” by Hayes’ letter, Sam added after his signature:

April 10 Tuesday – In Hartford, Sam typed a letter to Matt H. Hewins, about the cushions on his billiard table. “They seem to act first rate when we threaten to change them,” Sam observed [MTP].

April 10 Thursday – Sam wrote from New York City to Thomas Bailey Aldrich about being unable to come to Boston until Thursday next, due to a dinner invitation for Wednesday (Apr. 16), but would plan on being at the Aldrich home about 4 PM on that day [MTP]. Sam purchased a copy of Faust. A Tragedy, translated by Bayard Taylor (1879) [Gribben 264].

April 10 Friday – Before leaving for New York, Sam wrote from Philadelphia to Karl Gerhardt, recommending Erastus Brainerd, who had inquired after Gerhardt “with great interest” [MTP]. Note: Brainerd (1855-1922) a Connecticut native and Harvard graduate was a journalist. He would later move to the Northwest and become editor of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

April 10 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Lou W. Benjamin, sister to William Wright (Dan De Quille). He was responding to a letter not extant.

Come — & if you are as good as Dan, you can sit by our fire as long as you want to. However, I suppose they don’t put two like Dan in one family. To do that, would be to cheapen miracle [MTP].

April 10 Sunday – The Brooklyn Eagle, on Apr. 11, 1887 page 4, ran a notice of the Apr. 10 passing of John T. Raymond. See also the N.Y. Times, Apr. 11, p.1 “COLONEL SELLERS IS DEAD”.

“There’s Millions in It”

April 10 Tuesday – Lorettus S. Metcalf telegraphed Sam with news of Matthew Arnold’s “Civilization in the United States,” originally published in London’s Nineteenth Century for April:

April 10 Wednesday – In Hartford, Sam responded to an unidentified person he addressed as “My Dear Cousins.”

I suppose you have got it a little wrong, & that you are cousin to my niece Mrs. Annie Moffett Webster, of Fredonia, N.Y. My wife’s former name was Langdon, & she doesn’t seem to have any relatives outside of the State of New York [MTP].

April 10 Thursday – Paulo Fambry wrote from Italy seeking Sam’s permission to translate CY into Italian and to dramatize part of it [MTP].

April 10 Friday – Sam had received a phonograph from the New England Phonograph Co., but it came with a repaired seal to a battery. Franklin G. Whitmore wrote for Sam that the battery had been shipped back for replacement [MTP].

April 11 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to his mother, and sister. He and Livy were taking Rosa and the children on a week’s “rest & change of aggravations” to Boston the next day.

“Orion’s head is as full of projects as ever, but there is one merciful provision—he will never stick to one of them long enough to injure himself” [MTLE 5: 68].

April 11 Monday – Sam began a letter (in Hartford) to Karl and Hattie Gerhardt which he completed Apr. 19.