THE MARK TWAIN CIRCLE OF NEW YORK was formed in 1999 as a successor to the long-established Mark Twain Association of New York, which was founded in 1926 and survived until age and infirmity overtook it in 1998. NEW! "Better Than It Sounds" -- The Musical Mark Twain,
a unique program of words and music,
coming to Cooper Union April 25thNEW! The Great Mark Twain Writing Competition
Courtesy of the Buffalo/Erie County Public LibraryAfter a very well-attended and enthusiastic launch meeting, all of the group’s officers became so distracted with Y2K preparedness and other weighty matters that the nascent Circle was pretty much left to fend for itself, alas.
It is the sponsors’ earnest hope that this program will help spark a revival of interest. They believe New York is too great a city, with too many Twain-related landmarks and connections, not to have an active Mark Twain interest group.
Though popularly associated with the American frontier and life on the Mississippi, Samuel Langhorne Clemens -- Mark Twain -- actually spent many of his happiest and most productive years in and near New York City.In 1926, only 16 years after Mark Twain's funeral at the Brick Presbyterian Church on New York's Fifth Avenue, Ida Benfey Judd, an enthusiastic and inspiring teacher in the New York public schools, established a small group to perpetuate the memory and study of the humorist's writings and his New York associations.
By the early 1930s her organization, known today as the Mark Twain Association of New York, was a conspicuous ornament on the city's cultural scene. Activities ranged from an annual celebration of Twain's birthday to scholarly lectures, an annual contest for the best quotation from Twain's writings, and in 1935, the humorist's centennial year, a citywide high school students' poster contest and exhibition.
Mark Twain had attained the stature of a national icon by the 1940s and '50s, when American presidents would present visiting heads of state with copies of Huckleberry Finn. Ironically, that book became something of a cause celebre in 1957 when the New York City Board of Education dropped it from the list of approved textbooks.
Huckleberry Finn had been banned in some cities on its first publication in 1885 for its supposed coarseness and vulgarity; this time the complaint was that it was "derogatory to Negroes." Either way, it was censorship.
The Mark Twain Association jumped into the fray. President Bessie Wherry Noe, who had succeeded Mrs. Judd, pointed out that the book was in fact a plea for racial tolerance, and ultimately the Board of Ed, in its wisdom, permitted it to be "reinstated."
The Association's meetings at that time were still held at the old Astor Hotel near Times Square. The guest-performer at one memorable luncheon in 1958 was an aspiring actor named Hal Holbrook, who, complete with cigar and curly white wig, presented a riveting one-man show drawn from Twain's writings, which he called "Mark Twain Tonight!"
The rest, as they say, is history. The program was wildly acclaimed on Broadway and on tour around the country, Mr. Holbrook became an internationally acclaimed performer, and he has been known to say (with overmuch modesty) that it was the Mark Twain Association that launched him in that role. In any case he has remained a generous friend of the Association as well as an honorary member.
The roster of honorary members has been distinguished, beginning with Helen Keller. Twain had met her in New York when she was fourteen, and afterward helped arrange for her education, saying, "It won't do for America to allow this marvelous child to retire from her studies because of poverty." The popular journalist-author Ben Lucien Burman, whose novel Steamboat Round the Bend was later filmed with Will Rogers in the lead role, was another honorary member, as was Prof. Lewis Leary of Columbia University, author of Mark Twain's Letters to Mary and Mark Twain and Henry Rogers.
In the 1960s, under President Lois Demarest Langdon, actor Will Geer was invited to present his superb portrayal of Mark Twain for the Association, before going on to TV immortality as Grandpa Walton.
Members have always been encouraged to share the results of their own studies and efforts, however, and for most of its events the Association has relied on home-grown talent.
Programs during the 1960s and '70s featured among other offerings the poems "To Mark Twain" by Emily Barto and "A Ballad of Mark Twain" by Burton Frye, both set to music by member Ruth Bradley, while Prof. Leary often read papers researched at Columbia and at the University of California's unique Mark Twain archives.
Under Presidents Joy Hampton and Sydney Dauer, the Association in 1970 instituted an annual August picnic with readings, as a sort of joint venture with the New York Poetry Forum. Members of the Walt Whitman Society, the Shelley Society and others often joined us for these events, originally held at Wave Hill, Twain's one-time "rural" residence in Riverdale, the Bronx.
When the opulent Clemens home on Farmington Avenue in Hartford was opened to the public as the Mark Twain Memorial in 1974, the Association arranged bus tours to the site, sometimes enlisting as many as a hundred members and guests. Other activities include art and photography exhibits, lectures and slide talks on Mark Twain's life and works, his place in American life and letters, and his unfailing relevance to contemporary issues.
On April 26, 1980, the 70th anniversary of Twain's death, Association members gathered for a brief ceremony at 14 West 10th Street, the only surviving Mark Twain home in Manhattan. In 1984 Alice Chapman Dauer, the Association's president since 1975, spoke at the Lincoln Center Library and Center for the Performing Arts on "Mark Twain 'Unfamiliaribilia.'"
Samuel Clemens' 150th birthday, November 30, 1985, was honored with a walking tour of Twain-related landmarks in Manhattan, led by author Peter Salwen, a member of the Association's Board. The "Mark Twain's New York" birthday tour, on or near November 30, has since become an annual tradition.
In 1981 President Dauer, with the expert guidance of attorney Mark Charles and architectural engineer Howard Leavenworth Seeley, formally secured the Association's future tax-exempt status by reorganizing it as a not-for-profit corporation.
Today the Mark Twain Association continues in its principal mission of increasing public knowledge of and interest in Mark Twain's life and works, through lectures, discussions, and musical and other programs. Current activities include, besides the annual birthday tour and picnic (now held in Central Park) and occasional special events, four to six Sunday afternoon programs, which are held at the rectory of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, located at 7 West 54th Street. These generally include a brief update of Association business and a lecture, slide talk, or similar offering, followed by a musical program and a coffee hour. Dates and programs for the 1996-97 season will be announced following the Summer Board meeting in August.
The Association's collection of materials on Mark Twain is available to the general public. A number of scholarships have been provided in the past for students of the author and his work. The Association continues to pursue a number of long-range goals that were proposed by President Sydney Dauer. These include reactivating the scholarship program, cataloging and finding a permanent home in an appropriate library or research center for the Association's voluminous archives, now lodged in several temporary quarters, and ultimately, establishment of a center for Mark Twain studies in New York.
The preceding description was written and posted in 1996. Since then, after the passing of the MTA's last president, Mrs. Alice Chapman Dauer, the organization ceased to function officially. However, as described above, plans are currently afoot to re-create a successor organization, the Mark Twain circle of New York, and your participation and suggestions are welcomed gladly -- including pproposals for scholarly talks (academic or otherwise), lectures, or musical or spoken performances. To contact us, click here to use our our convenient quote-capable e-mail form.
Other Mark Twain Resources on the Internet:
"Better Than It Sounds" -- The Musical Mark Twain
And visit these additional Mark Twain pages on this site:
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