The Mark Twain House, Hartford, Connecticut. Completed in 1874. Credit: George Ruhe

Mark Twain's house sits on a shady hillock, right next door to Harriet Beecher Stowe's house, overlooking bustling Farmington Avenue. This nineteen-room mansion, designed by Edward Tuckerman Potter (with help from Mrs. Clemens), was built over fifteen months in 1873-74.

Like its famous resident (who began the composition of his masterpiece, "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," here), 351 Farmington Avenue was the subject of much amazed gossip at the time. "The oddest-looking building to be lived-in in the state" is how The Hartford Courant described it.

While it is not true that Twain, a former riverboat pilot, had the house consciously designed to resemble a Mississippi riverboat (a popular misconception), it is indeed an odd-looking structure, with its vibrant red brick façade, elaborate woodwork, and high porches tucked beneath steeply-pitched roofs.

Front Hall: Louis Comfort Tiffany and his firm Associated Artists, created the North-African inspired decorations for the fronthall. Credit: The Mark Twain House

Twain entertained prominent figures of the late 19th century in this lavish drawing room. Credit: The Mark Twain House

The house was outfitted with all the modern comforts available to a family of means - there were seven bathrooms, each featuring a flush toilet, and it was heated by a coal furnace and illuminated by gas. Twain rigged a rubber tube from the gas chandelier in the bedroom to a lamp on his nightstand, allowing him to work in bed.

He also installed one of the first private telephones in Hartford (so that he could make harassing phone calls to his publisher), but the instrument was an endless source of frustration, offering little more than sputtering and static much of the time. Twain, an early consumer advocate, sent a monthly "report card" to the telephone company, rating the service: "Artillery can be heard [on the line]"; "Thunder can be heard"; "Artillery and thunder combined can be heard!"

The Twain house reveals much about the man and his family, and one can picture Twain at home with wife and kids, their dog, Hash, some twelve cats (Twain wickedly gave them such names as Sin, Satan, Sour Mash, Famine, Flood, Pestilence...), and the numerous guests who attended the Clemenses' frequent dinner parties (as many as three or four a week).

The Clemens family on the porch in 1885. Credit: The Mark Twain House

The most interesting room is of course Twain's study at the top of the house, dominated by the billiard table where he shot a rack or two to clear his head while writing. Is there an historic home in America still so alive with the spirit of its first owner? Doubtful, most doubtful.

by Sean Abbott

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