19 March 1875 • Hartford, Conn. (Transcript: CtY-BR, UCCL 01212)
gentlemen: pleaseⒶemendation do not use my name in any way. please do not even divulge the fact that i own a machine. i have entirely stopped using the type-writer,Ⓐemendation for the reason that i never could write a letter with it to anybody without receiving a request by return mail that i would not only describe the machine, but state what progress i had made in the use of it, etc., etc. i don’t like to write letters, &Ⓐemendation so i don’t want people to know i own this curiosity-breeding little joker. 1explanatory note
For Clemens’s first typewritten letters, see 9 Dec 74 to OCclick to open link and 9 Dec 74 to Howellsclick to open link. Although James Densmore had withdrawn from his partnership with George Washington Yost, the firm they founded to market the Remington Model I typewriter still operated as Densmore, Yost and Company, General Agents, located at 707 Broadway in New York. On 18 March 1875 James Martin, the Boston agent who had sold Clemens his typewriter the previous November, sent him the following request (CU-MARK):
I have received a letter from our people in New York, asking me to try and get them some letters, from parties using the machines, to be published in a grand new circular, which they are getting up. These pamphlets are to be used by all the agents, all over the country; and they want to get as many letters as they can from prominent people using the machines. Can you say anything for us? If you can say anything for our side of the case, I shall take it as a great favor, if when you feel like it you will do so. Machines are now being used by a great many people, and are getting quite largely introduced.
On the back of Martin’s letter Clemens wrote: “About the Type-Writer. New invention. I bought one six months ago. Never heard of it before. Refused to let my name be used because it would breed correspondence from idle, question-asking people. S. L. C.” The present letter, Clemens’s refusal, presumably went to Martin for forwarding to the general agents. Densmore, Yost and Company printed it as the first of nine letters in their advertising circular, the source of the text reproduced here. All of the letters in the circular were typeset in capital and lowercase letters, although it is clear that many of them were written on the Remington typewriter, which had capitals only. In 1905, Harper’s Weekly reprinted Clemens’s letter in an article about his early use of the typewriter, describing it as “an old typewritten sheet, faded by age,” with “the signature of Mark Twain” (SLC 1905). It is therefore presumed that Clemens typed his refusal, even as he professed to have “entirely stopped using the typewriter.” The version reproduced here has been restored to the form of the typed original, in capitals except for the handwritten signature.
Printed transcript in an advertising circular for the Remington typewriter, produced in 1875 by “Densmore, Yost & Co., General Agents, 707 Broadway, New York,” Willard S. Morse Collection, Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University (CtY-BR). The addressee of this letter is conjectural. When the Remington Company printed it in an advertisement in the 18 March 1905 issue of Harper’s Weekly (inside the front cover), the words “E. Remington & Sons” were included below the dateline—presumably added by an editor. The reprinting of the Harper’s text in the Atlanta Constitution for 3 April 1905 read “E Remington & Sons, Ilion, N. Y.”—presumably a further editorial addition (see SLC 1905). Since most of the other letters in the advertising circular were addressed to “Densmore, Yost & Co.,” it is assumed that Clemens’s letter was also addressed to the company. Clemens apparently typed the original, and then signed it, despite his claim that he had “stopped using” the typewriter: the Harper’s article begins, “Some days ago a correspondent sent in an old typewritten sheet, faded by age, containing the following letter over the signature of Mark Twain.” The copy-text has therefore been emended to all capital letters, except for the signature, since the Remington typewriter that Clemens owned had no lowercase letters. All proper names, words beginning sentences, and the word “I” were capitalized in the copy-text; all ambiguous readings are listed below as emendations.
L6, 419–420; MTL, 1:256; SLC 1905; Herkimer County Historical Society, 71; Train, 302–3; Bliven, 62.
The Morse Collection was donated in 1942 by Walter F. Frear.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.