7 June–28 September 1871 • Elmira, N.Y. (MS: Craven, UCCL 11811)
enclosure: 1explanatory note
The inscription on the photograph reads:
The most determined singer in America sends his warm regards to the most notorious one.
Elmira
j. e. larkin , Blacksmith elmira, n. y.
The lady is his aunt, who sat for his mother & did it very well indeed, with the exception of resemblance—she broke down there.
In her photograph album, Olivia labeled another print of this picture of Langdon and Susan Crane “Langdon Clemens 6½ months,” indicating that John E. Larkin took it around 21 May 1871 (CSmH; Boyd and Boyd, 143). Olivia is not known to have posed for a photograph with Langdon. Although she had been “as feeble as ever” in April, by early June she was “much stronger” and could have sat with him (4 Apr 71 to OCclick to open link; 7 June 71 to OC and MECclick to open link). She did not, possibly because Langdon soon became “seriously ill” (23 July 71 to Bowenclick to open link). By 28 September, shortly before the Clemenses moved to Hartford, they had exhausted their entire supply of baby pictures, including the present one (28 Sept 71 to Lantclick to open link). Clemens evidently enclosed the Larkin photograph (reproduced here from a print by Robert D. Rubic) in a letter to Bret Harte (now lost) after they resumed good relations. Clemens had campaigned for a reconciliation, sending letters to Charles Henry Webb and Thomas Bailey Aldrich—Boston friends of Harte’s—in which he extolled Harte and explained their inadvertent falling out (26 Nov 70 to Webbclick to open link; 27 Jan 71 to Aldrichclick to open link). He had thereafter either met with Harte in Boston or received a letter (now lost) from him.
References
- Collection of Robin Craven.
- Machlis, Paul, ed. Union Catalog of Clemens Letters. Edited by Paul Machlis. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press. [In some cases, UCCL catalog numbers cited in this volume supersede those assigned in 1986 and reflect corrections or additions to the catalog since publication. An updated version of the catalog can be consulted via the Letters Search page at MTPO.] 1986
- SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 4: 1870–1871. Edited by Victor Fischer, Michael B. Frank, and Lin Salamo. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1995
- Winterich, John T. “The Life and Works of Bloodgood Haviland Cutter.” The Colophon Book Collectors’ Quarterly 1 (May): no page numbers. 1930
- Henry E. Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, Calif.
MS on carte de visite photograph in the collection of Mrs. Robin Craven.
L4 , 397–398; Winterich, 20.
The photograph, on exhibition in 1936 at the bookshop of G. A. Baker and Co., was at an unspecified date acquired by Mrs. Craven’s father, Sidney L. Krauss.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.