January 16 Saturday – Sam’s guestbook:
Name Address Date Remarks
Edward Quintard New York Jan 16 1909
Lumbring Kant [?] New York Jan 16 1909
Frank Lascelles Oxford – Keblelon “ 16 “ [see notes below]
John Elton Wayland New York 17-18 Jan 16, 1909
The Man in the White Suit: Day By Day
January 17 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Busy every moment. / (Dublin note—July 7, 1905) Mr. Clemens takes up a novel and begins in the middle and swings along to the finish” [MTP: TS 38]. Note: just why she added this to Jan. 17 is not known. Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Today Mr. Clemens sat for several hours in the study. Gout Continues. Miss Harrison sent a check to Mr. Larkin for $841.21 for transfer tax to be paid on Mrs.Clemens’s estate” [MTP TS 2].
January 17 Wednesday – Sam attended a meeting to form an association for a 1907 centennial of Robert Fulton’s Claremont. The New York Times, Jan. 18, p. 8, “For a Monument to Fulton” reported the presence of Mark Twain. On Feb. 18, the Times, under the same heading, reported Samuel L. Clemens as an “incorporator”and printed his letter of acceptance to the committee:
Mr. Clemens, in accepting membership on the committee, wrote the following letter:
Mr. Clemens, in accepting membership on the committee, wrote the following letter:
January 17 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to daughter Jean, whose incoming is not extant:
Why yes, dear Jean, your character—as I saw—had indeed softened, but the other day, it seemed to have hardened (temporarily only, I think) toward Anna & the others, on account of what you regarded as unjust conduct toward you. But I did not seem to blame & reproach you, did I? I could not mean that; in my heart I have no reproaches for you, but only mournings for your unearned estate.
January 17 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Julia Langdon Loomis.
Julie dear, I wrote you a day or 2 ago, but I don’t remember what I said because I was sober at the time. But this not is to say—to-wit: The next Doe-Luncheon will happen at the above address on Tuesday, Feb. 11 at 1 p.m. You are hereby invited. Don’t fail to come, dear.
[in left margin] Not one declined before! [MTP].
Sam also wrote to the Other Depositors of the Knickerbocker Trust Co..
January 17 Sunday – William B. Jones for Raymond & Whitcomb Co., Boston wrote to ask for information on an article he’d seen years before attributed to Clemens on the “Waters of The Ganges, etc.” [MTP].
January 17 Monday — In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to the New York Telephone Co. requesting telephone books. His letter is not extant but referred to in the Company’s Jan. 20 reply; since Paine wrote the below for Clemens, it’s probable he also wrote this letter [MTP].
Albert B. Paine wrote for Sam to Mrs. Emma Gertrude Quick.
January 17-20 Sunday – In N.Y.C. Isabel V. Lyon wrote instructions from Sam to write to an unidentified man: “Write Mauritius man & say it isn’t Mr. Clemens’ story but it couldn’t be any better if it bore his trademark” [MTP].
January 18 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Today Santissima’s beautiful black cat Bambino arrived. Katie brought it down in a cab. A patient in Santissima’s sanitarium cannot stand cats and she is to be there for a fortnight. It is Mr. Dana’s birthday” [MTP: TS 38]. Isabel Lyon’s journal# 2: “Mr. Clemens took more cold when he sat in the Study yesterday, and today he is not so well” [MTP TS 2].
January 18 Thursday – Sam was a pallbearer for John Malone, actor, who died on Jan. 15. The funeral took place at the Church of St. Francis Xavier on W. 16 Street. Requiem mass was celebrated by the Rev. Father Van Rensselaer. A large group from The Players attended. Other pall bearers were: Barton Hill, Daniel Frohman, J.H. Benrimo, Jacob Wendell, Jr., T.J. Hallowell, Charles Harvey Genung, and David A. Munro [NY Times, Jan. 19, 1906, p. 11, “Funeral of Actor John Malone”]. See also Nov. 16, 1898 to Malone.
January 18 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to the Jan. 3 of Margaret Christensen.
“Dear Madam: /I thank you gratefully for your welcome letter, which has deeply touched me. Nothing could be more gratifying to me than to know that my dear lost wife’s beautiful character has spoken to you from the grave & that you have treasured the message” [MTP]. Note: From Brooklyn.
January 18 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “King is really ill today” [MTP: IVL TS 10]. Note: bronchitis.
In the afternoon Edmund Clarence Stedman (1833-1908) died of a heart attack in his NYC apartment. He was 74 [NY Times Jan 19, 1908, p. 1, “E.C. Stedman Dies of Heart Disease.”]
At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to a reporter from the N.Y. Times, who solicited his response to the news of Stedman’s death. Sam’s dictated response ran in the Jan. 19 paper.
MARK TWAIN STUNNED.
———
January 18 Monday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Mai H. Coe and William R. Coe.
Dear Coes:
January 18 Tuesday — William Dean Howells wrote from NYC to Sam.
Dear Clemens: / While your wonderful words are warm in my mind yet, I want to tell you what you know already; that you never wrote anything greater, finer, than that turning-point paper of yours.
I shall feel it honor enough if they put on my tombstone, "He was born in the same Century and general Section of middle western Country with Dr. S. L. Clemens, Oxon., and had his Degree three years before him through a mistake of the University.”
January 19 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave. Jean Clemens wrote for her father to Anne Sullivan.
My dear Miss Sullivan; / As Father is still ill in bed with gout he cannot write you himself and has therefor asked me to do so for him.
He was of course very much pleased to hear of your happy engagement, especially so as he once met M Macy, at Mrs. Hutton’s, I believe.
January 19 Friday – Joe Twichell wrote to Sam.
I declare that the deeps penetrated and explored in much research as this of radium more affect me with the sense of sublimity than those discovered by the telescope. Really this would be an admirable sort of an universe if it wasn’t for the Human Race. Yet it’s the Human Race that has captured the knowledge both of the Light Year and of Radio-activity. Perhaps it will amount to something eventually. / Yrs Aff. / Joe [MTP].
I declare that the deeps penetrated and explored in much research as this of radium more affect me with the sense of sublimity than those discovered by the telescope. Really this would be an admirable sort of an universe if it wasn’t for the Human Race. Yet it’s the Human Race that has captured the knowledge both of the Light Year and of Radio-activity. Perhaps it will amount to something eventually. / Yrs Aff. / Joe [MTP].
January 19 Saturday – The Hope-Jones Organ Co. was incorporated in Elmira, New York, with capital stock of $250,000 in 750 shares of 7% cumulative preferred shares and 1500 shares of common stock, all in $100 shares. The three directors: John Brand, J. Sloat Fassett, and Robert Hope-Jones. Jervis Langdon II was president and treasurer, and Hope-Jones vice- president. Jervis’ Uncle Sam Clemens subscribed to $5,000 worth, payable over time on “calls,” as did Edward E.
January 19 Sunday – In the morning Dr. Edward Quintard checked on Sam’s condition again, noting that he was “no worse” [NY Times Jan. 20, 1908, p.9 “Mark Twain No Worse”].
The New York Times, Jan. 18, 1908, ran a squib under “City Brevities” p.9:
January 19 Tuesday – In Redding Clemens wrote to Frank Cavendish Lascelles, English actor and pageant director who had visited on Jan. 16-17:
Dear Mr. Lascelles: / Mr. Clemens asks me to say that he is very willing to have you burgle the enclosed, & with it sends his warm regards. / Sincerely Yours / Isabel Lyon Jan. 19/09
[first enclosure: postcard with photograph of Stormfield]
[Second enclosure in SLC’s hand:]
TO THE GUEST
January 19 Wednesday — Ragnvald Blix wrote on Simplicissimus notepaper from Munich, Germany:
I have just received the St. Sebastian [drawing] from my exhibition in Christiana and a friend of me, who goes to New York in some days, takes the drawing with him (I have heard that the luggage of drawings in America is very detailed and troublesome)
I hope, that the Sebastian is welcome in Stormfield? [MTP].
January – In N.Y.C. Sam spent the last part of December and all of January in bed, recovering from another case of bronchitis, followed by attacks of gout in his feet [Jan. 8 Lyon to Whitmore; Jan. 25 to Crane].
Sam wrote to the International Plasmon Co., London
January – In N.Y.C. Sam wrote an aphorism to The Printer’s Home: “Let us save the to- morrows for work. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain, / Jan./06” [MTP:Mac Donnell, No. 22, Item 123].
Sam also inscribed a printed bust portrait of himself to an unidentified person: “S.L. Clemens / Truly yours / Mark Twain / Jan.06” [MTP:Hamilton catalogs, Sept. 12, 1968, Item 88].
Sam also inscribed a photograph of himself to Klaus Kaempher in Berlin: “Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Jan./ 06” [MTP].
Sam also inscribed a printed bust portrait of himself to an unidentified person: “S.L. Clemens / Truly yours / Mark Twain / Jan.06” [MTP:Hamilton catalogs, Sept. 12, 1968, Item 88].
Sam also inscribed a photograph of himself to Klaus Kaempher in Berlin: “Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Jan./ 06” [MTP].
January – James Logan (1852-1929) mayor of Worcester, Mass (1908-1911) wrote to Sam, sending him a translation of Omar Kayyam by Eben Francis Thompson [MTP] Inscriptions: the portrait of E. F. Thompson is signed “Faithfully yours” by Thompson. Volume is inscribed: “To ‘Mark Twain’/Please accept this book as a partial payment on account for the many happy hours and hearty laughs which you have given me. With kind regards/faithfully yours/James Logan./Worcester, Mass.,/Jany. 1907.” Volume also signed: “SL. Clemens/1907.” Note: See Feb.
January – “Extract from Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven” first appeared in two installments in Harper’s Monthly for Dec. 1907 and for Jan. 1908. It was published by Harper as a book in Oct. 1909 as Extract from Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven. Budd points out that Twain worked on various versions of the story at multiple times—in 1869, 1870, 1873, 1878, 1881, 1883, and 1893 [Budd Collected 2: 1013].
January –Samuel Wyatt wrote from Berks, England to offer three pages of verse after reading JA [MTP].
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