per Telegraph Operator
6 or 7 February 1875 • Hartford, Conn. (Paraphrase: Salt Lake City Tribune, 9 Feb 75, UCCL 11983)
By advertisements and play bills, it had been given out that “The Gilded Age,” dramatized from Mark Twain’s celebrated novel of that title, would be presented in the Salt Lake Theater on Monday night, and accordingly a large audience was attracted to witness the expected performance last evening.1explanatory note But, as the curtain was about to rise and give “Col. Sellers” an opportunity to see how he looked in the sock and buskin of Willie Gill, a new candidate for histrionic laurels appeared at the footlights, in the person of Deputy United States Marshal A. K. Smith, armed with a writ of injunction against the buccaneers who contemplatedⒶemendation an act of piracy on the high sea of literature. The Doctor made a decided hit, but he crushed “The Gilded Age” in the twinkling of an eye. This is the legal history of the affair: Mark Twain, (Samuel L. Clemens) of Hartford, Connecticut, is the author as he is
sole owner of the copyright
of the celebrated work of fiction, which by the Act of Congress, of 1870, he has also the exclusive right of dramatizing. In 1873, he did dramatize the novel, and subsequently entered into a contract with John T. Raymond, the eminent actor, by which the latter was given the exclusive right to the play, and guaranteeing legal protection from all infringement by the theatrical profession.2explanatory note On last Saturday, Col. E. D. Baker,3explanatory note of this city, who is a personal friend of Mr. Raymond, telegraphed that gentleman, that the play was then posted for Monday night in the Salt Lake Theater. Raymond then at once complained to Mr. Clemens of the trespass on his property, whereupon, also the latter telegraphed Messrs. Tilford & Hagan, his attorneys here, to take immediate steps to prevent the representation of “The Gilded Age,” by the pretended owners.4explanatory note These gentlemen, with their usual ability forthwith prepared for war in the courts, if necessary, to save the interests of their client.
The source of this letter, and the four that follow, is a single account in the Salt Lake City Tribune of a dispute about an unauthorized local production of a play based on The Gilded Age. The account paraphrases—and briefly quotes—the instructions that Clemens telegraphed to his Utah attorneys. This Gilded Age dramatization was the second that Clemens had protested, although he soon claimed there were three piracies (see 5 May 74 to Warnerclick to open link, nn. 2, 4, and 16 Feb 75 to Spoffordclick to open link). The new play was “dramatized from the novel expressly” for Willie Gill by an unidentified author, “without reference to the version now being played by Mr. Raymond.” Gill, a “popular Australian comedian,” had recently come to Salt Lake City from Virginia City, Nevada, where he appeared in several productions at Piper’s Opera House in September and October 1874, remaining as “acting manager” until the end of December (Salt Lake City Herald: “‘The Gilded Age’ to Be Enjoined,” 7 Feb 75, 3; “Willie Gill as Colonel Sellers,” 7 Feb 75, 3; “Theatre,” 8 Feb 75, 3; Virginia City Territorial Enterprise: “Piper’s Opera House,” 29 Sept 74–30 Dec 74, 2). On 6 February 1875, the Salt Lake City Herald announced that on Monday, 8 February, Gill would make his
first appearance in an adaptation of Mark Twain’s great American novel of “The Gilded Age.” Mr. Gill illustrates the character of the widely-speculative, but withal, honest hearted Colonel Sellers, who, with all the will to make everybody’s fortune, cannot find the way to keep his family in the common necessities of life. (“‘The Gilded Age,’” 3)
See 15 and 16 July 74 to Watt, n. 4click to open link, and 3 Nov 74 to the editor of the Hartford Evening Post, n. 4click to open link.
Unidentified.
Presumably Clemens was referred to Frank Tilford and A. Hagan by his Hartford attorney, Charles Perkins. The present telegram is the first of five that Clemens sent following the announcement of Gill’s play; the only source for them is the Salt Lake City Tribune’s paraphrases in its account of the episode, which is preserved verbatim in this and the next four letter texts (“Mark Twain in Court,” 9 Feb 75, 3; Sloan, 224, 286).
Paraphrase, “Mark Twain in Court,” Salt Lake City Tribune, 9 Feb 75, 3. Copy-text is a microfilm edition of the newspaper in the Newspaper and Microcopy Division, University of California, Berkeley (CU-NEWS).
L6 , 371–373.