Mark Twain's Hartford Home

Quarter Twain, Half Twain, Mark Twain! They those are steam boat terms of old age, when steam boats were a popular way of transportation on Mississippi Rivers. Mark Twain means safe water. Though we are not familiar with the terms quarter twine and half twain, but we know the word Mark Twain. Yes, one of the greatest writer in American literature  of all time made those two very word famous. 

When I was little girl I read two novels of Mark Twain translated into my native language. Those two novels made me a big fan of him. So, I introduced my son to his works. Surprisingly, he also fell in love with his works. When he learned about the museum he added in his wishlist to visiting that museum. My son loves to read Adventure of Tom Sawyer, which was written loosely based on his own life. 

Like his literature, his life was also very fascinating. Born as Samuel Langhorne Clemens in a shack in Florida,Missouri he established himself to the epitome of literature. He lost his father in a very early age, and had to stop schooling. He started working as printer from a very tender age. Then  he joined as cub pilot in steamboat. The life as a pilot gave him immense material to write all those beautiful adventurous novels. Though he had formal education unto grade 5, he educated himself in public libraries. His life experience was huge.

After his marriage he started living in Hartford which was a very prosperous town at that time. Many literary personnels, and other intellectuals preferred to live in Hartford at that time. The first seventeen years of his married life he lived in that era house with his family. It was the happiest time in his life. After many ups and downs in his life when he again came to Hartford he refused to live in this very house. So, he sold it, and went to another house in Hartford. 

Anyway, in Hartford our main attraction was to visit his house. Our tour guide described the functions of each and every room of the house. The walls of the rooms were very dark. The tour guide told that the dark walls could reflect the gas lighting the era of no electricity. 

There is also a little story about his own servant, George Griffin. Our guide told that, one Mr. Griffin came to the house and kicked the door. Mr. Griffin told that he was willing to work for the family.He took care of Mark Twain’s  every single nitty gritty. We saw all the bedrooms, the nursery. The study room for their children. Though he was self educated, his wife was college educated, and she wanted to give good education to their children.In the third floor of the house there was two rooms. On one room he often discussed all serious political matters with other great fellows late night, and the adjacent room was for Mr. Griffin. He used stay closer so that he could serve Mark Twain. Mark Twain was very much against slavery. He never treated Mr. Griffin as a servant, rather he was his assistant.

After seeing the bedrooms, we went upstairs where he spent times with intellectuals, and the adjacent room where his servant lived.

After seeing the entire house we went downstairs to see the not so glamorous kitchen. At that era, the kitchen need not to be as glamorous as rest of the house. The lady of the houses rarely come to the kitchen, whose job not to direct the maids. 

He was great risk taker, and the enthusiastic about technology.He invested a great amount of money in Paige Compositor. We saw the enormous machine in the museum. He thought that, that machine would have great success, and would get a huge market value. On the contrary to that the machine didn’t get success at all, and went bankrupt. To repay his debt he started world tour giving speech, along with his wife. Though he could repay his debts, but the time was not in his favor.  During his tour he lost his eldest daughter back home, and he couldn’t even attend her funeral. When he came back to Hartford, everyone rejoiced that, but he couldn’t. After coming back they couldn’t live in the same house which was bearing all the memory of his daughter. They sold the house and moved to a different.I n his later age, he faced many personal  losses which made him cynical. Still he didn’t lose his humor. 

In 1835 he was born just after Haley’s comet appeared in the sky. In 1909 he told, “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t go out with Halley’s Comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: ‘Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together.” Indeed that happened. He died of a heart attack in 1910 just one day after Haley’s comet appeared in the sky.