In support of red hair: In olden days, the balance of a person’s “humors” (the options were blood, black bile, yellow bile, or phlegm) were thought to play a large role in determining an individual’s personality (people were either sanguine, melancholic, choleric, or phlegmatic, and you could often tell all of that just by looking at them). In his notebook from 1855, 19-year-old Samuel Clemens copied down several pages of information about these types, taken directly from _Lectures on Mental Science According to the Philosophy of Phrenology_, a treatise written by St. Louis clergyman George Sumner Weaver in 1852. Clemens’s greatest interest was in the “sanguine temperament,” which was “the burning, flashing, flaming temperament,” recognizable by “red, blazing hair and countenance,” with “impulsiveness of, and hastiness of character.” It was the sanguine personality that “loves excitement, noise, bluster, fun frolic, high times, great days, mass meetings, camp meeting, big crowds.” [Frederick Anderson, Michael B. Frank, Kenneth M. Sanderson. eds., _Mark Twain’s Notebooks and Journals, Volume I, 1855 – 1873_. Berkeley, University of California Press, 1975, pp. 21 – 22.]

Pat Ober

-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Twain Forum <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Mac Donnell Rare Books
Sent: Tuesday, July 9, 2019 5:00 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: carrot-top Twain

When I reviewed Gary Scharnhorst's Mark Twain: The Complete Interviews, I took careful notes on reporters who described Twain's appearance (white suits, eyes, hair, posture, gait) and mentioned some of that in my review. The reporters noted he had blue eyes. No gray, or hazel, or blue-green reports. It seems Clara agreed.

The photo I have has excellent color register and he's wearing his Oxford robes (which survive at Hannibal). Years ago Tom Tenney and I got very serious about documenting the precise colors of Twain's Oxford robes which he was putting on a cover of the MTJ. We consulted Henry Sweets who examined the original robes carefully. I consulted photographic experts on autochrome photos, and even obtained color-swatches from the original firm that made those robes for Oxford University. The colors in the robes in my color photo are accurate, so I think his blue eyes, yellowed mustache, and pink cheeks are accurate as well, all being captured in the same light. I'd take eye-witness testimony and photographic evidence over whatever Twain wrote on any forms. In that connection, I must mention that when I was a fire commissioner it was a constant source of amusement that applicants lied on forms. Both men and women lied about their weights (about 40% of applicants subtracted 5 or more pounds), and men lied about their heights (about 40% rounded up or added an inch). We didn't ask about eye or hair color.

Somebody in an unsigned posting said Twain's hair was auburn, not red. 
Twain made no such distinction. In CY he said "When red-headed people are above a certain social grade their hair is auburn."  In a conversation between Twain and Susy Clemens witnessed by Henry Fisher (who is not always reliable, it should be said) Twain supposedly said "I was born red-headed." By 1879 reporters said his hair was graying. 
Howells, who knew him ten years before his hair turned gray, didn't just call his hair red; he called it a "splendid shock of red hair." Now, if Howells suffered from red-green color-blindness, it's possible Twain had a splendid shock of green hair, but I'm doubtful.

Most of my Irish friends with red hair and blue eyes have watched their hair darken to red-brown, then more brown, then gray, then white, and then none at all. An older friend of mine who'd had red hair in his youth had cancer and underwent radiation treatments and lost his white thinning hair. But it grew back thick and bright day-glow orange, almost apricot, and then slowly turned red. But by the end of the first year it had darkened to red-brown, then brown, and then thinned out just as before. His eyes stayed blue, before and after.

The descriptions I've seen indicate that Twain's hair followed the same trajectory as most of my Irish friends, but did not thin out much.

Kevin
@
Mac Donnell Rare Books
9307 Glenlake Drive
Austin TX 78730
512-345-4139
Member: ABAA, ILAB, BSA

You can browse our books at:
https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.macdonnellrarebooks.com&d=DwIFaQ&c=yzGiX0CSJAqkDTmENO9LmP6KfPQitNABR9M66gsTb5w&r=EpFFnG9nDY_WcZIpOQKLpVpq7BJ7aXItIoruIi6oyDo&m=gNs8omyjXVprH5KcnFIWhplHhiiZFPb9QXadKwh5RYQ&s=czgy9Pvh4nrvmtJhpKFOzEVx-BnRy6BA93O5V8pRkHE&e= 


------ Original Message ------
From: "Mallory Howard" <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: 7/9/2019 2:49:37 PM
Subject: Re: carrot-top Twain

>We have a copy of "The Love Letters of Mark Twain" edited by Dixon Wecter that was owned by Clara. In the introduction SLC is described as having "blue-green eyes." You can see Clara's alteration in the attached photo!
>
>
>
>
>Mallory
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Mark Twain Forum <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Barbara Schmidt
>Sent: Tuesday, July 09, 2019 2:36 PM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: carrot-top Twain
>
>As to eye color, Clemens’s 1891 passport application is also online at ancestry.  It matches the 1867 passport application regarding eye color.
>The eye color is stated as gray in both applications.
>
>Barb
>
>On Tuesday, July 9, 2019, Alan Kitty <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>>  I completely disagree about conflicting eye color evidence. You have 
>> a  photograph depicting apparent blue. My eye color is hazel. But  
>> depending upon the weather, sky and landscape tone, and clothing  
>> color, they reflect gray, blue or green. And I have had more than one  
>> audience member comment about my blue eyes.
>>
>>  Also, I would say that Twain’s own comment about his “auburn” hair  
>> (although I do not recall where I read the remark) is a more credible  
>> source than commentary by any less involved observer.
>>
>>  Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>  > On Jul 9, 2019, at 1:02 PM, Mac Donnell Rare Books <  
>> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>  >
>>  > The evidence is in conflict on the matter of Twain's hair color.  
>> W  > D  Howells, who met Twain in 1869 had this to say about his hair 
>> color ca.
>>  1885 when Twain was 50 (My Mark Twain p. 29):
>>  >
>>  > "Clemens was then hard upon fifty, and he had kept, as he did to 
>> the  end, the slender figure of his youth, but the  > ashes of the 
>> burnt-out years were beginning to gray the fires of  > that  splendid 
>> shock of red hair."
>>  >
>>  > There is no conflicting evidence about the color of his eyes. They  
>> > were  blue. Not hazel, or blue-green, but very blue. I have an 
>> unpublished  color photo (autochrome) of Twain taken on December 13, 
>> 1908 that  clearly shows his blue eyes, the yellow cast on his 
>> mustache (caused  by smoking), and his pink cheeks.
>>  >
>>  > Kevin
>>  > @
>>  > Mac Donnell Rare Books
>>  > 9307 Glenlake Drive
>>  > Austin TX 78730
>>  > 512-345-4139
>>  > Member: ABAA, ILAB, BSA
>>  >
>>  > You can browse our books at:
>>  > https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.macdonnellrarebooks.com&d=DwIFaQ&c=yzGiX0CSJAqkDTmENO9LmP6KfPQitNABR9M66gsTb5w&r=EpFFnG9nDY_WcZIpOQKLpVpq7BJ7aXItIoruIi6oyDo&m=gNs8omyjXVprH5KcnFIWhplHhiiZFPb9QXadKwh5RYQ&s=czgy9Pvh4nrvmtJhpKFOzEVx-BnRy6BA93O5V8pRkHE&e= 
>>