Vol 3 Section 0746
Joseph Blouin, builder in Tarrytown, wrote to Sam that he would shingle the chicken house and the ice house, flash around windows and other misc. work for $211.72 [MTP]. Note: He then billed Sam for this amount [1902 Financials file MTP].
June 5 Thursday – Sam’s notebook: “J. Ross Clemens / 110 N. 8th st. St Louis / smoker. / Rochambeau reception./ Mayor Wells. / The stolen watermelon. & skiff” [NB 45 TS 16].
Livy’s diary: “Mrs Orton Bradley & Mildred Holden here for tea, beside Mrs Whitmore” [MTP: DV161].
In Columbia, Mo. Sam wrote to Charles E. Still. “I remember you very well, & I wish I could accept your kind invitation, but my time is filled up & I am obliged to deny myself the pleasure” [MTP].
At 6 p.m. Sam arrived back in St. Louis, where he was given a reception and dinner by James Ross Clemens. The St. Louis Republic, June 6, p.2 announced his return to the city:
Renewed Welcome to Mark Twain
Wearing the additional honor of Doctor of Laws, conferred upon him by the State University, Samuel L. Clemens returned to the city yesterday [June 5] from Columbia, Mo., to receive a renewed welcome. As Mark Twain the weight of the newly acquired distinction rested lightly upon him. As Doctor Samuel Clemens, however, he took advantage of the degree.
“I am told that a Doctor of Laws ranks a Doctor of Medicine and other kinds of doctors,” he said last night at a smoker given in his honor by his cousin, Doctor James Ross Clemens…. “For this reason I propose
to remain seated while the other doctors stand.” And he did ….
Robertus Love’s article, “Dr. Mark Twain at a Smoke Talk,” ran in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, June 6, p.2 and gives some additional details on the smoker given by Sam’s cousin, James Ross Clemens. The gathering included about 50 men at the home of James Ross, who had moved into the house only a week before; he’d been in England for the past 20 years studying medicine. An additional event this evening was hosted for Mark Twain, which is revealed in this article:
At 10:30 Walter B. Stevens arrived with an invitation from President Francis of the St. Louis Club for Dr. Clemens (M.D.) and his guests to attend the club’s reception in honor of the Count and Countess Rochambeau. The party proceeded to the St. Louis Club, where Mark Twain held an involuntary reception in the garden, gay with lights and lovely ladies’ faces.
The great Missourian talked with the count in French and with the countess in English. He talked with the other ladies and gentlemen in any language that came to hand. No language appears to stump Mark Twain; for, though he was not the Latin linguist of Hannibal public school of half a century ago—the one and solitary pupil who knew Latin—he has become a cosmopolite and can palaver many dialects, from Mississippi river patrols to Volapuk.
Until midnight the author was the center of groups of admirers. …
This evening Mr. Clemens will dine at the St. Louis Club as the guest of honor, Theophile Papin being the host.
Saturday he will visit the World’s Fair site and other points of interest, and at noon Sunday he will board the Knickerbocker special for New York, where he will retire to his home at Riverdale-on-the-Hudson and smoke some cigars.
[Notes: David Rowland Francis (1850-1927), ex-Mayor of St. louis, Gov. of Missouri, and U.S. Sec. of Interior, was the president of the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair committee. Theophile (Toto) Papin (1857-1916) was a prominent citizen. Sorrentino claims reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Robertus Love, boarded Sam’s train in Illinois on the incoming trip, and that “approximately one hundred newspaper articles record an almost hourly account of his activities” p.13; Sorrentino reports that two girls gave Sam flowers at
SLC used mourning border for most letters from Susy’s death on, then from Livy’s death on.