daybyday.marktwainstudies.comMark Twain Day By Day

Mark Twain Day by Day Menu Volume 1 Volume 2 Volume 3 Volume 4 Mark Twain Day by Day David Fears’s Mark Twain Day by Day was originally a print reference, meticulously created by David Fears, who has generously made this work available, via the Center for Mark Twain Studies, as a digital edition. Please recognize that this is a preliminary, BETA version of a resource which we will continue to develop in the coming years. While we are excited about the functionality it currently offers - for instance, the searchbar in the upper left-hand corner - we also recognize that there are numerous errors (to formatting, spacing, punctuation, etc.) which were not part of the print edition. Moreover, the formatting may change based upon which browser you use to access the site. Rest assured, we are continuing to work to correct these problems and increase functionality so as the maximize the accuracy, accessibility, and user-friendliness of the resource. If you encounter major technical difficulties or find entries that have been made particularly messy or indecipherable during the digitization process, please let us know via [email protected] Search for: Search Vol 1 Section 0001 Mark Twain Day by Day An Annotated Chronology Of the Life of Samuel L. Clemens Volume One (1835-1885) Second Edition David H. Fears Vol 1 Section 0002 © 2008, 2014 David H Fears All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Second Edition, volume one First Printing 2013 ISBN # 0-9714868-2-4 ISBN13 : 978-0-9714868-2-9 Library of Congress XE "Library of Congress" Control Number: 2007927972 Published by Horizon Micro Publishing, LLC Books available directly from the publisher: Horizon Micro Publishers, LLC P.O. Box 266 Banks, OR 97106 [email protected] ; http://MarkTwainDayByDay.webs.com Acknowledgments Thanks to my wife, Kimberley for her love and support. Special thanks to Thomas A. Tenney for his continual support, anecdotes, and advice, to whom this 2nd edition volume is dedicated. Without his many calls, this project would have been completed six months earlier (though perhaps not as complete). Thanks to JoDee Benussi for sharing mountains of paper and extra books. Thanks to the folks at the Mark Twain Project, especially Robert Hirst and Victor Fischer, who really do possess quite a good sense of humor, and who gave freely of their time, advice, and opinions, as well as permissions for use of MTP material. Thanks also for help and contributions made by the following: Barb Schmidt, Robert Slotta, Kevin Mac Donnell, Robert Monroe, Martin Zehr, Ron Vanderhye & Carol Beales for permission from the James S. Copley Library, La Jolla, Ca., and Debby Applegate, the 2007 Pulitzer prize winner for Henry Ward Beecher’s biography. Lastly, thanks to certain readers of the MT ListServ who have encouraged my efforts, including Jason Horn, Michael McBride, Arianne Laidlaw, Wes Britton, and Steve Crawford. A personal thanks also to Duncan Carter at Portland State University for his friendship and encouragement even though he favors Dickens over Twain, as well as David W. Robinson for his steadfast faith in my ability in the face of much evidence to the contrary. Vol 1 Section 0003 Dedicated To Thomas A. Tenney (1931-2012) Scholar, editor, friend, who made this work possible. This second edition completes his vision. What a wee little part of a person’s life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself. All day long, and every day, the mill of his brain is grinding, and his thoughts, not those other things, are his history. His acts and his words are merely the visible, thin crust of his world, with its scattered snow summits and its vacant wastes of water—and they are so trifling a part of his bulk! a mere skin enveloping it. The mass of him is hidden—it and its volcanic fires that toss and boil, and never rest, night nor day. These are his life, and they are not written, and cannot be written. Every day would make a whole book of eighty thousand words—three hundred and sixty-five books a year. Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of the man—the biography of the man himself cannot be written. M.T. Foreword David H. Fears’s log of Samuel Clemens’ life is often downright interesting in itself for Twainians. Furthermore, they will get a heightened sense of the whirligig he somehow shaped into an ongoing presence—his now well-known business activities, his tireless socializing, his dealings with plumbers, and his paying bills for groceries (including pilsener beer and cigars, of course). As for Mark Twain authors, Fears will help resolve some cruxes while setting up others unsuspected until now. I’m envious that my generation didn’t have this resource when we were starting out.” – LOUIS J. BUDD – Professor Emeritus at Duke University, author of Mark Twain: Social Philosopher More fascinating and far better documented than any existing biography of Mark Twain, this study provides a window into every waking—and for that matter, sleeping—moment of Twain’s hyperactive life. Many scholars before David Fears had contemplated undertaking this staggeringly daunting but incredibly useful project….All students of Mark Twain should give heartfelt thanks for this masterful accomplishment. Fears interweaves even Twain’s most quotidian activities into a textured fabric, threading helpful explanations where needed. This book now qualifies as the single most essential reference work in Mark Twain scholarship. We will be indebted to David Fears forever.” – ALAN GRIBBEN – Author of Mark Twain’s Library: A Reconstruction Mr. Fears must be fearless! To undertake such an immense project certainly requires courage. Going day-by-day in Twain’s life gives valuable information regarding Twain’s multi-faceted literary, business, and speculative career. Despite the short length of the quotations the flavor of Twain is there: his attention to household matters, his caring role as husband and father, his experience with publishers, the wide-ranging friendships and his biting wit. Fears’ volumes will be a major contribution to Mark Twain Studies.” ­– HOWARD G. BAETZHOLD – Author of Mark Twain & John Bull In these pages there is a rich record of the life, works, and Twain’s family and friends.” – THOMAS A. TENNEY, author of Mark Twain A Reference Guide; editor of The Mark Twain Journal . David H. Fears’s enormous Mark Twain Day By Day: An Annotated Chronology of the Life of Samuel L. Clemens …takes Twain’s activities all the way from [1835-1910]. A huge index even lists such things as Twain’s donations and individual gifts. Surely all Twain scholars and editors will want to have this research available in their campus or personal libraries. This massive project, undertaken by an independent scholar unsupported by grants, subventions, or even a conventional publisher, has to rank as one of the most extraordinary individual efforts by any one student of Twain ever to see print.” – ALAN GRIBBEN, American Literary Scholarship 2010. Introduction (from First Ed.) Samuel Langhorne Clemens lived 74 years, 4 months, and 23 days—or 27,171 days. At 27 years of age he began using the nom de plume , Mark Twain,” which most Americans have known him by since. It is understatement to say that his life was a full one. His life has become an area of study that can occupy a lifetime and still reward researchers with fresh insights into the man, his era, and the human condition. Some 40 years ago I gained an undergraduate degree in history, and started but did not finish a graduate program, focusing on the Populist Movement of the 1880s and 90s. I was surprised then to discover that Mark Twain had visited my hometown, Portland Oregon, in 1895 on a world tour. It was a fact I tucked away for four decades, till I turned back to graduate school after careers in business and computers. I often wondered what Sam did here in the Rose City—what did he see? Whom did he...