The identification of Harriet Wasson is correct. I know her one of her descendants personally, and she has a copy of the book with the author's signature in it, as well as some of the family history. My friend was amazed that I knew of the book, and I was delighted to have the mystery of its authorship solved! We have known each other for years, but the subject never came up before. Wasson's brother Joseph was a journalist who for a time edited a newspaper in Bodie, California. I turned my info over to Ken Sanderson, who has been collecting a file on the rest of the family, some of whose letters are here in the Bancroft Library. Harriet Smith At 12:49 PM 3/23/2000 -0500, you wrote: >Thanks, Kevin, for that list. We've had the sections of *Facts, By a >Woman* that treats selling Mark Twain door-to-door in California up in the >site *Mark Twain in His Times* for a couple years, but I didn't know about >the other two books. If I can track them down, I'll try to add them to >*Facts.* And thanks, Barbara, for finding out more about who "A Woman" >was. There's a copy of the book in the Barrett Collection here at U.Va., >but no identification of the author. Unless someone in the Forum thinks >there is any reason to doubt the identification, I'll add the information >as "probable" to the site, and pass it on to our cataloguer. >If you want to read the excerpt from *Facts,* its in *Mark Twain in His >Times* (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/railton) under the category >"Marketing Twain." It's very readable, and a good reminder of how >complicated were the motives that 19th century Americans had for buying >Twain's books. Stephen Railton > > >At 11:24 AM 3/23/00 -0600, you wrote: > >In reponse to one part of Kevin Mac Donnell's questions regarding > >_Facts By a Woman_ -- there appears to have been some later > >research done on her and her book. WorldCat lists the following > >entry: > > > >AUTHOR: =CAWasson, Harriet, b. 1842.=20 > >TITLE: =CAFacts by a woman : written 1877 by Harriet Wasson, born Sept. 15, > >1842, Wooster, Ohio (daughter of John M. Wasson, 1802-1883)=20 > >PLACE: =CAWest Milton, Ohio :=20 > >PUBLISHER: =CAA.M. Schumann,=20 > >YEAR: =CA1996=20 > >PUB TYPE: =CABook=20 > >FORMAT: =CA1 v. (various pagings) : ill., maps, ports. ; 29 cm.=20 > >NOTES: =CA"A biography and book review done in 1973"--P. [2] Facts by a > >woman originally published: Oakland, Calif. :Pacific Press Publishing > >House, 1881. 356 p. photocopied two pages to one, with some slight error > >in sequence. "Reprinted [photocopied] and added to by Arthur M. Schumann." > >pt. 1. A biography and book review / by Arthur M. Schumann -- pt. 2. Facts > >by a woman / by Harriet Wasson.=20 > >SUBJECT: =CAWasson, Harriet, -- b. 1842. Oakland (Calif.)=20 > >OTHER: =CASchumann, Arthur M. =20 > >