December 28 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “Write Wm. E. Dodge—or call at his house if I should go to town” [NB 44 TS 19]. Note: William E. Dodge, Jr. was a Riverdale neighbor.
Theodore Roosevelt wrote to Sam:
Praise from Sir Hubert, my dear Doctor! (Loomis Nelson tells me you resent, since our Yale experience, the failure to give you your proper title). [Doctor]
December 28 Sunday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam finished his Dec. 27 letter to William Dean Howells.
In bed, 8 a.m., Sunday. Katy has just been in to say Jean’s temperature is down to 102.
10 a.m. It is now down to 101 by Clara’s report.
Noon. I am up & dressed, & have been aloft, but Jean could not be disturbed—she was inclined to sleep. I had a glimpse of her. She looks like a survivor of a forest-fire.
December 28 Monday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to George B. Harvey.
If Wood is confirmed, this is a pæan of drunken joy; if it’s the other way, it is a wail, a lament; in either case it is a note of contempt for the President & his catamite.
You may find it injudicious to print it. You are on the spot & will know. In case of non-printing, please return it to me, for there might come a time during election-year when the atmosphere might change & in your judgment make it available.
December 29 Saturday – At the “Country Club” (Quarry Farm) in Elmira., Sam wrote to James B. Pond. “We are on the way to New York. Any morning that you would like to talk, I am on deck at home at 10.30, but writing wastes time, for manifestly it accomplishes nothing. / Yours…” [MTP].
Irving S. Underhill wrote from Buffalo, N.Y. to Sam.
December 29 Monday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote a long letter to Susan Crane that he added a short pararaph to on Dec. 30.
December 3 Monday – At 1410 W. 10th in N.Y.C., Sam wrote to Augustus T. Gurlitz (1843-1928), New York attorney representing Rudyard Kipling.
I thank you quite immeasurably for the Kipling set, & you must send for the Fenno lot whenever you need it, for I doubt if I get a chance in six months to study the matter….
If you didn’t get Howells to make an affidavit, he must do it. Everybody should help [MTP].
December 3 Tuesday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam replied to Elisabeth Marbury’s Dec. 2 question. He had no preferences after Francis Wilson, and so left the matter in her hands [MTP].
Frank Fuller wrote from N.Y. on his Health Food Co. stationery to Sam.
December 3 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Jean, Katy & I returned from the Elmira wedding” [NB 45 TS 34].
Note: Sam dared not travel alone with Jean due to her epilepsy, and so took Katy along, who had family in Elmira.
December 3 Thursday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Eleanor V. Hutton (Mrs. Laurence Hutton). “I thank you ever so much for your congratulations, & for sending me that accurate description of me. Been in bed a week, but am getting around again. With love to you both…” [MTP].
Susan Crane wrote to Sam (here used the forwarded copy for Rogers typed by Jean with a few comments added by Sam):
December 30 Sunday – The New York Herald ran a facsimile of Twain’s handwritten salutation from Mark Twain that had been sent originally to the Red Cross Society, and returned at Sam’s request. The facsimile published was dated Dec. 31, 1900; the copy to the Red Cross Society was originally dated Nov. 29, 1900, for use in a series of watch-meetings on New Year’s Eve, organized by the group’s manager, Frank D. Higbie, nephew of Calvin H. Higbie, Sam’s old mining partner.
December 30 Monday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam replied to Thomas Bailey Aldrich, wishing they could come to Boston but “must put the temptation by; that seductive holiday is not for slaves.” Sam related the blissful state of his work—he was having “a noble good time,” with all his days his own, taking “no engagement outside the city & not more than 2 per month in it.”
December 30 Tuesday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam was allowed to see Livy for nearly four minutes [Dec.31 to Twichell].
Sam also added a short pararaph to his Dec. 29 letter to Susan Crane.
“Dec. 30. 6 a.m—(which is about dawn.) I have been up to Jean’s room, & find all quiet there—Jean sleeping. Miss Tobin whispered, ‘She has had a splendid night.’ The doctor (& Clara) had put in an appearance a couple of times in the night & gone back to bed, finding things going well” [MTP].
December 30 Wednesday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Frederick A. Duneka.
Happy New Years to you all—last shout for this year!
Before I forget it. You & the Colonel will naturally be on the lookout for first-class short-story talent— therefore, seek out the man that wrote the police-story (Irish & New York) in the Evening Post of Dec. 14, & secure him. If that story isn’t well told, tell me so & I will take my medicine.
December 31 Monday – At 1410 W. 10th in N.Y.C., Sam replied to Abner Cheney Goodell in Salem, Mass., who had written praise of his N.Y. Herald “salutation” of Dec. 30.
December 31 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “The Players—Midnight Speech. Joe Jefferson to introduce me & flatter the Club, I to respond & refute” [NB 44 TS 19].
In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to Chester Sanders Lord for the Lotos Club.
December 31 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Saw her for 5 minutes” [NB 45 TS 36].
In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote a long letter to Joe Twichell that he added to on Jan. 1, 1903. Sam headed the letter The Last day of a—in some respects—Tough Year being A.D. 1902”:
December 31 Thursday – Josephine C. Wheeler (Mrs. Henry M. Wheeler) wrote to Sam, wishing his family a happy New Year, and asking if she might call. She wrote that she knew Mrs. Moffett and Mrs Webster (his sister and niece) of Fredonia, NY [MTP]. Note: Sam instructed on the env. “Please say our day is Thursday.”
C.H. Curtiss & Co., Hardware, Plumbing & Tinning billed Clemens $73.52; paid on Jan. 15, 1904 [1903 Financials file MTP].
December 4 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Plasmon to Hutton. / Aldine Club—evening—no reporters. W.W. Ellsworth. / Traveling with a corpse” [NB 43 TS 30]. Note: indeed there were reporters at the Aldine Club this evening. The NY Times reported on the dinner and Sam’s speech on Dec. 15: Mark Twain at the Aldine Club
December 4 Wednesday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to Horace N. Allen (1858-1932), American Minister in Seoul, Korea (1897-1905).
I am very glad to have that historical digest, & I thank you for sending it. I hope your boys have successfully resisted all of Tom & Huck’s efforts to dismoralize them, & that they are stronger for the resistance.
December 4 Thursday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam wrote to Frederick C. Harriott who had coughed up part of the $500 owing Charles W. Stoddard. For weeks Sam and William Dean Howells had been acting in Stoddard’s behalf to recover money owed from Harriott, a literary agent in Boston.
December 4 Friday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to William Dean Howells.
The Xmas No. is fine, & a worthy place for your moving & beautiful poem. How many it comes home to; how many have felt it, & having felt it once will feel it always. The crime of the Invention of the Human Race—how much it has to answer for!
December 5 Wednesday – At 1410 W. 10th in N.Y.C., Sam wrote to John Y. MacAlister. After some delay caused by registering the letter, Sam got MacAlister’s letter on Dec. 4, referred to in a cable, and then cabled his approval.
December 5 Thursday – Charles E. Flandrau of the defunct St. Paul Roller Mill Co. sent a form letter to Sam asking for a proxy for a Jan. 4, 1902 meeting about the final disposition of two pieces of real property which had not yet sold [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote a note on the letter on Dec. 12 and sent it to H.H. Rogers.
Joseph Issacs wrote from N.Y.C. to Sam that he’d rec’d Sam’s check this day and would ship “segars and 2 pipes you ordered next week” [MTP].
December 5 Friday – In Riverdale, N.Y. Sam replied to William Denison McCrackan’s Dec. 4 letters:
I am glad to have the book and the other printed matter and I thank you. But as helps in “verifying or correcting statements of fact” in my articles they will not be of service to me. I have made no statements of fact that can require that sort of doctoring.
December 5 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “The water was again shut off to-day. Upon inquiry, the Maestro di Casa was gone a brief journey” [NB 46 TS 31].