Home at Hartford: Day By Day

October 3 Tuesday – Sam wrote a long letter from Hartford to Charles Webster, explaining agreements past and actions taken with Slote & Co. about payments on scrapbook sales [MTBus 201-3].

October 3 Friday – At one time Sam was instructing Charles Webster to telegraph important information; now he wrote from Hartford telling him “to use the telegraph less freely…it is not twice in 5 years that a W.U. telegram beats a letter between N.Y. & Hartford” [MTP]. Sam wrote another short note to Webster on or about this date about having a rubber stamp made that would cross out the “Osgood & Co.” on envelopes he had and print Webster’s address [MTP].

October 3 Saturday – Sam’s notebook:

I think I’ve struck a good idea. It is to reduce a series of big maps to mere photographic fly-specks & sell them together with a microscope of ¼ to 1 inch focal distance. By this means I could conveniently examine my synchromatic map which is 36 ft long [MTNJ 3: 196]. (See also note 48.)

October 3 Monday – William Mackay Laffan wrote to Sam about the Dec. 7, 1886 investment in International Telegraph and Cable Co. 

…as to the great cable invention…let me explain to you in person, when I see you next, what a Goddamned humiliating and degrading fizzle it proved to be…and how the first of experts are the cream of asses, and how I am now fully trying to get the money back [MTNJ 3: 262n117].

October 3 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to his brother Orion about hickory nuts, Theodore Crane, and the Paige typesetter.

Keep a sharp lookout for some particularly bully hickory nuts; & when as usual you send us a bag, send a bag also to T.W. Crane, Elmira. He is getting along pretty fairly….But apprehension concerning him is not at an end…

October 3 Thursday – Sam finished his slipper for Elsie Leslie, the partner of one knitted by William Gillette, out of admiration for the girl actress [Oct. 5 to Leslie].

Sam’s notebook: Oct. 3. One [Paige royalty] to Orion Clemens; the other to Mrs. P.A. Moffett [3: 569].

Charles Ethan Davis wrote another typesetting record on a postcard to Sam, this one including three apprentices, “F,” “J,” and “S”. [MTP].

October 3 Friday – Unknown person for the N.Y. Sun sent Sam a printed, three-page folded form signed by Theo. L. De Vinne, president of the New-York Machine Type-setting Co.,which sang the praises of the McMillan typesetting machine [MTP].

October 30 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Joseph Blackburn Jones. Sam related his decline of the invitation to the Army Reunion in Chicago, the letter from Colonel Tuttle and his desire to give a different toast to Grant. He had telegraphed Colonel Tuttle again. Sam was waffling about coming—the distance, the weather, the time it would involve, etc. [MTLE 4: 123].

October 30 Saturday – Sam telegraphed from Hartford to Frank Fuller in New York City, answering an invitation to speak at another political meeting, this one on Sunday.

“I have no superstitions about sunday myself but I would not preside at a political meeting on sunday for it would be certain to injure the cause you must get a man whose religious reputation is better than mine” [MTLE 5: 188].

October 30 Sunday – Orion began a letter he finished on Oct. 31. He was glad Sam liked the papers he sent and was delighted with the photographs Sam sent, the “three children are beautiful…” Other family and acquaintance doings [MTP].

October 30 Monday – In Hartford Sam typed a one-liner to Charles Webster. “Dear Charlie, Give the man the papers he wants, or kill him, I don’t care which” [MTBus 204].

Orion Clemens wrote from Keokuk.

My Dear Brother: / The $150 came from Perkin’s to-day.

      I moved into my office to-day. Been with Marshall some weeks. Didn’t have fires; caught cold; couldn’t study; they talked too much.

October 30 Tuesday – Charles Webster wrote about business matters: contract signed with Watson Gill “to act as my agent in the trade” [MTP].

October 30 Thursday – Sam wrote to J.M. Stevenson for Illustrated Christian Weekly, letter not extant but referred to in the Nov. 1 reply from Stevenson.

Joseph Stein for Mark Twain Literary Union, NYC wrote to announce the formation of their group, 32 including 12 ladies. He asked Sam for “a few words” [MTP].

October 30 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to his mother, Jane Clemens.

October 30 Sunday – A ballot was taken at Webster & Co. Whether to publish the late Nathaniel J. Burton’s divinity lectures. Charles Webster voted no on this date and Sam voted yes on Oct. 28 [MTBus 387]. There is no mention of a vote breaking the tie, such as from Frederick J. Hall but this may be because Sam had a larger interest in the firm.

October 30 Tuesday – Sam gave a speech at a Mugwump political rally, Allyn Hall, Hartford. The speech was reported and summarized in Hartford Courant, October 31, 1888, p.8 “Mugwumps in Council.”

Frederick J. Hall for Webster & Co. wrote to Sam arguing for a meeting in N.Y., not in Hartford as Sam evidently asked, for the reason that Daniel Whitford needed to be there [MTP].

October 30 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Bruce Weston Munro, who as a 21-year-old hopeful writer in 1881, contacted Sam for advice and occasionally sent him writing to review. He evidently did so again because Sam responded:

I’m going to read the preface sure — & you have the word of an honest man for it [MTP].

Note: Sam never offered much to Munro in the way of advice, which may say something about his opinion of Munro’s writing. See also Mar. 17, 1887.

October 30 Thursday – Sam arrived in Hannibal at 9:55 a.m. Jane Clemens was buried in the afternoon under a large tree at Mount Olivet Cemetery, next to the graves of her husband John Marshall Clemens, and son, Henry Clemens. Sam left for home again in the evening [MTNJ 3: 592n67; Powers, MT A Life 532].

From Burlington, Iowa Sam wrote to Orion and Mollie Clemens, thanking them both for their faithful service in taking care of Jane Clemens “these terrible 8 years.” His trip back was stalled.

October 31 Friday – Sam wrote a check drawn on George P. Bissell & Co., Bankers, Hartford, to Water Commissioner, $22.50 [MTP].

October 31 Sunday – Howells wrote from Boston to Sam.

I have read your Hartford speech twice; and your memoranda, even, can’t put it out of my mind….I await with curiosity your result with the Scotchman [George Gebbie]. If he does not behave honorably, the question for us to consider will be how we can honorably steal his idea. But if we try to be good, we shall be helped [MTHL 1: 337].

October 31 Monday – In Hartford, Sam wrote again to James R. Osgood, to coordinate when he needed to go to Canada. Osgood had written that the book could be set up in 48 hours there, so was no need to set it up in Boston. Sam could leave the evening or morning of Nov. 27, but since that was Livy’s birthday, he didn’t want to go the day before, as perhaps Osgood had suggested.

October 31 Tuesday – Karl Gerhardt wrote to Sam and Livy, excited about their new professor for sculpture, M. Falguera, “one of the strongest French sculptors of the day.” He enclosed a notice from “the Boston Advertiser regarding a proposed equestrian statue of Paul Revere”—didn’t Sam think it a good idea for him to enter the contest for the Revere statue? [MTP].

October 31 Wednesday – Hubbard & Farmer bankers & brokers sent a statement with Nov. 1 balance of $22,949.11 [MTP].

October 31 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Edward House, who evidently had reminded Sam of a promise made that Sam could not recall. House hadn’t been specific. Sam wanted to “run to Japan” but felt it was not possible. He told of his upcoming four month platform tour, wishing he hadn’t promised but it was too late “to cry about it.”

October 31 Monday – In Hartford, Sam responded to Robert Underwood Johnson’s invitation for Sam to read. He agreed, provided that the date would be the 29th, not the 28th; and that he would read either second or third on the program [MTP] (See Nov. 28 entry.)