Greetings!

As you may know, the annual Twain-Twichell walk was postponed last fall
because of rain, and we now have a date for the rematch with the slopes of
Talcott Mountain: Saturday, May 30 (the weekend after Memorial Day Weekend.)

In the current economic climate, this is a bargain. Where else can you get
a free day of healthy enjoyment and exercise, and an absolute lack of
fundraising
or other worthy ends? And a chance, as Sam Clemens said of one
walk with his friend, the Rev. Joe Twichell of Hartford, to extend the
subject of  conversation from "everything we knew" to "the glad, free
boundless
realm of the things we were not certain about"?

Many of you have not been on the walk before, so let me recap quickly. In
1995, in the course of writing an article about Mark Twain's friendship
with Twichell, I got John Boyer of the Mark Twain House and the Rev. Jim
Kidd of Asylum Hill Congregational Church (Twichell's church) together. We
followed a route similar to Clemens' and Twichells' autumn and spring walks
from their Nook Farm neighborhood to a wooden tower that stood near where
Heublein Tower now stands in Simsbury. The custom has persisted, with groups
large and small, for the past 14 years. Jeff Nichols, Executive Director
of the Mark Twain House, and I lead the walk.

The distance is about eight miles and the last mile is uphill. We meet at
the
Mark Twain House and leave promptly at 9, walking city streets, suburban
roads
and finally woodland paths. We stop for a picnic lunch at Auer Farm, the 4-H
farm
in Bloomfield, and read from Twain and Twichell. We return to the Mark Twain
House
in cars, which early-rising volunteers have left at the Heublein Tower
parking lot.

We don't rush, but get back to the Mark Twain House, say, around 2.

If you'd like to come, or need more information, email back or call me
at 860-589-6412. As usual, I'll need volunteers to leave cars at Heublein
Tower before the walk.


Steve Courtney
Terryville, CT 06786