March 11, 1906 Sunday
March 11 Sunday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

This morning I went in with some more left over mail. A letter from John D. Rockefeller S.S. [Sunday School] chairman or something, asking Mr. Clemens to address that class. He chuckled and said “I daren’t be with them, but I’d like it mighty well,” for he’d talk about Joseph of course. We had such a talk about the human race.
March 12, 1906 Monday
March 12 Monday – George Henschel wrote fom the Institute of Musical Art, 53 Fifth Ave. to Sam:

On case your daughter Clara can’t accompany you to my little Bohemian (or rather Bavarian) dinner on Tuesday the 20 at the Aufbrauhaus, won’t you give me the pleasure of your company even if you have to come alone?…We shall be twelve all round—all round a round table—in a very cosy Room, drinking the most delicious Munich beer imaginable. Pray come and make us all young and happy [MTP]. Note: Sam’s reply, instructing Miss Lyon to telegraph “yes” is dated ca. Mar. 14.
March 13, 1906 Tuesday
March 13 Tuesday – At 21 Fifth Ave., N.Y. Sam wrote to Gertrude Natkin. In full:

To whom these presents shall come—greeting:

One unto you unknown— & yet a Friend—instructs me to beg you to hold free of engagements the evening of April fifth. This, from Another Unknown Friend [MTAq 20].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Jean, at 8 this morning. Santa C. came back from Atlantic City.
March 14, 1906 Wednesday

March 14 Wednesday – At 21 Fifth Ave., N.Y. Sam replied to Edward M. Foote’s Mar. 9 invitation:

March 15, 1906 Thursday

March 15 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave., N.Y. Sam wrote an aphorism to Florence Watson- Cadieu, secretary of the Whidden Memorial Hospital Guild, Everett, Mass. “On the whole it is better to deserve honors and not have them, than have them & not deserve them. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain” [MTP].

Sam hosted a dinner for the Rogerses and Dr. Edward Quintard [Hill 124].

March 16, 1906 Friday

March 16 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam began a siege with a bad cold which would keep him in bed until Mar. 23. He wrote to Gertrude Natkin:

To whom these presents shall come—greetings & salutation. And thereto—this: It’s postponed to April 10 , you little rascal. Unknown Friend” [MTAq 20].

Gertrude Natkin wrote a short reply:

March 17, 1906 Saturday

March 17 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Isabel V. Lyon replied for Sam to an unidentified person:

“Mr. Clemens not very well wishes me to thank you very much for your letter which greatly interested him—& that far from objecting to his translating the article into French it is a compliment which I accept with pleasure & hold at a high value—” [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:

March 18, 1906 Sunday
March 18 Sunday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Gertrude Natkin, who, upon learning from Isabel Lyon that Sam was in bed with a cold, had sent flowers.  

Aren’t you dear! Aren’t you the dearest child there is? To think to send me those lovely flowers, you sweet little Marjorie. Marjorie! don’t get any older—I can’t have it. Stay always just as you are—youth is the golden time.
March 19, 1906 Monday

March 19 Monday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to W.T. Hall.

I thank you very much for the clipping from the Atlantic [sic Atlanta] Evening News. I have waited these many years for you to hear me lecture, but now it is too late: I am taking my farewell of the platform three weeks hence. The hostiles say “But you are forgetting the gallows—” a joke which I am too proud & arrogant to notice [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Jean, 8:20  10:30

March 20, 1906 Tuesday
March 20 Tuesday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Frederick A. Duneka of Harper & Brothers about the illustrations for Eve’s Diary (1906).

We all think Mr. Ralph’s pictures delightful—full of grace, charm, variety of invention, humor, pathos, poetry—they are prodigal in merits. It’s a bonny Eve, a sweet & innocent & winning little lassie, & she is as natural & at home in the tale as if she had just climbed out of it. Now do you think draperies are indispensable to picture women? /Truly yours / SL. C.
March 21, 1906 Wednesday
March 21 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Jean to Lakewood.

C.C. & I went to see Otis Skinner in The Duel & a finer bit of unconscious sarcasm of stage traditions I’ve never seen. We were stunned into silence by Fay Davis’s inability to make one good or natural thing, but that inability was the saving of the play from hopeless mediocrity, & the placing of it was among the finest productions of the winter for old fashioned acting. It was glorious & we were convulsed, where everyone else was overcome by emotion—to tears [MTP TS 55].
March 22, 1906 Thursday

March 22 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave, Isabel V. Lyon wrote notes for Sam to answer Elisabeth Cutting.  “Mar 22—Think out a date for Reception. The Spanish girl Senorita Marcial will be here about Apr. 2. Would they like to invite Sen Marcial & her chaperon Miss Sanborn to this recep.” [Lyon:] “Mention this as M . Clemens would like to help her along in her work—in any way that comes along” [MTP].

Lyon also wrote the notes to reply to Moses Allen Starr’s Mar. 21 (the answer was sent at John Larkin’s suggestion by Isabel V. Lyon)

March 22-26, 1906 Monday

March 22-26 Monday – During this period Sam replied to Maude Clement Rice in Sawnee on Delaware, Penn.: “I am glad to have a copy of that letter, & shall also be very glad to sign the photograph—” [MTP]. Note: incoming not extant; possibly a relative of old “Unreliable,” Clement Rice?

March 23, 1906 Friday

March 23 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to Kate W. Barrett (incoming not extant):

March 24, 1906 Saturday

March 24 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Gertrude Natkin at 138 W. 98 St., N.Y.C.

March 25, 1906 Sunday
March 25 Sunday – Sam lunched with Miss  Winifred Holt and had tea with the Howellses [Hill 124].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Jean 9, 11, 4 (Lakewood, very bad day)

Mr. Clemens hates this house. He calls it “The Valley of the Shadow”.
March 26, 1906 Monday
March 26 Monday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to John Brown, Jr. (“Jock”).

Dear Mr. Jock: — / With this I am returning the typed letters which you sent. They pleasantly but pathetically bring back the scenes and associations of thirty-three years ago, when Mrs. Clemens and our small Susy and I were comrades of your father in Edinburgh daily, during six weeks, without a break.
March 27, 1906 Tuesday
March 27 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:
March 28, 1906 Wednesday

March 28 Wednesday – In the a.m. Charlotte Teller Johnson returned to 21 Fifth Ave. and read her play Joan d’Arc to Clemens. It was the beginning of almost daily visits between the two and much correspondence. See Mar. 27 entry.

March 29, 1906 Thursday

March 29 Thursday – At the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, Sam told a story at a benefit for the blind. The New York Times, Mar. 30:

TWAIN AND CHOATE TALK AT MEETING FOR BLIND
———
Humorist Sightless Once—in a Vast German Inn.

HIT AT GHOST, BROKE MIRROR

Mr. Choate Urges Liberal Contributions, Mr. Gilder Writes a Poem and Helen Keller a Letter.

March 30, 1906 Friday
March 30 Friday – Joe Twichell wrote from Hartford to Sam:

I am ordered on duty—as reader of a Scripture lesson only—at the service named on the enclosed card [not extant], which will be in commemoration of the close of the Civil War.
March 31, 1906 Saturday

March 31 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to George O’Connor.

April 1906

April – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam inscribed a copy of TS to Norman D. Bassett with an aphorism: “Few things are harder to bear than the annoyance of a good example. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Apl./06 / Norman D. Bassett” [MTP].  

Ellis Parker Butler (1869-1937) inscribed his book Pigs Is Pigs (1906) to Sam dated April 1906 in Flushing New York [Gribben 119].

April 1, 1906 Sunday

April 1 Sunday – Although not cited by Fatout or others, on Apr. 4, Charles F. Powlison for the YMCA wrote from NYC to thank Sam for addressing their Sunday afternoon meeting.

April 2, 1906 Monday

April 2 Monday – The New York Times, Apr. 3, p. 9, “Three New Plays at Vassar Benefit,” reported that “Mark Twain was the centre Times of one admiring group in a lower stage box…” at the Hudson Theatre, N.Y.C. The plays: The Mallet’s Masterpiece; The Land of the Free; The Watteau Shepherdess. Fatout offers more detail and some speculation about this event:   That he made a speech is not on record, but he probably said something.

Subscribe to The Man in the White Suit: Day By Day