Hartford, for me, is best visited during the Fall Twain Symposium--an
excellent opportunity to meet other Twain enthusiasts.  It's usually an
early October weekend.  (Have any details for this year been announced?)

Hartford is nearly the opposite of Hannibal.  Although I think
attitudes are changing, when I first visited, locals seemed barely aware
of Twain's extravagant mansion on the remains of Nook Farm.

Harriet Beecher Stowe's house, next door to the Twain home, is also
worth a tour.  I know of no other Twain landmarks except the church he
attended.

Details of the Asylum Hill Congregational Church may be found in the June 25
issue of Hartford's Twain's World, an online magazine of things of interest
in Hartford.  Twain's Worlds (no relation to the CD of the same name) may be
accessed, along with other internet sites, through Jim Zwick's internet Mark
Twain Resources page.

The modest Noah Webster home in West Hartford provides a good contrast to
Twain's extravagance.

Back to Florida, Missouri, does anyone know how to locate the remains of the
John Quarles farm?  I know much of it was covered by Mark Twain Lake and the
farm house has been torn down, but I understand that the Quarles homesite
is on private property on high ground.

And my out-of-the way thing to do in the Hannibal area:  There was a car
ferry south of Keokuk, Iowa, near Canton, Mo., I think.  As I crossed
the Mississippi with only the company of two ferry men on the tiny
ferry, I felt I had an idea of what the raft must have felt like to Huck
and Jim, a feeling which was not duplicated either on the Delta Queen or
the Hannibal Mark Twain "riverboat."

Thanks for reading:
Larry Marshburne