[FYI, I just posted this to the NYT's article site. /DDD ] Since we can't reach Henry Rogers of Standard Oil to help out Mr Clemens one more time, I see two sustainable routes to resolving the capital and cash flow issue with this national treasure. (And possibly a third, a blend of the first two.) A) Nationalize it. Allocate responsibility for the MT House to the National Park Service. If there is an American author who better merits this honor, I don't know who it is. B) Acquire patrons for a sizable capital fund. For example, solicit living American authors for "planned giving" committments to come out of their estates at the time of their deaths. (Asking them for money now wouldn't be a bad idea either, but we have to solve this problem, not patch it). Names like Roth, Updike, Kingsolver, Oates, Barry, King, Irving, Wolfe, Halperin and O'Rourke come to mind. Corporate sponsors who have benefitted from Twain's works in the public domain - Disney, for one - ought also to considering stepping up. C) Do both. There's no reason the approach needs to be all private or all public.