2. I appreciate the answer. I think it makes sense. By the way, I have no fear of reading your article, or any other article about Mark Twain; but I admit I haven't read your yet. I just retired (less than two weeks ago) from a 30 year career as a professor. That job kept me much too busy to do much reading for my own enjoyment. So, I've never subscribed to or read the Mark Twain Journal. That is a malnourishment I intend to cure in the next month or so. Your articles will likely be among the first I devour. 3. Unless the answer to how many times Clemens heard the term "mark twain" during his steamboat days is zero, I'd be extremely curious as to how you can claim to know how many times he heard it, given the distance in time. If the answer is that the term was never really used, then a river full of biographers and writers have a lot of explaining to do! So, in honesty, you have piqued both my interest and my skepticism with this claim. As for number 1 below, old guys make stuff up. I'm old; I make stuff up. But I am a rank amateur compared to the old Sam Clemens and his making stuff up propensities. Carl -----Original Message----- From: Mark Twain Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Kevin Mac Donnell Sent: Wednesday, January 28, 2015 3:53 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: That bar tab story. 2. Why did Clemens adopt a nom de plume? I hate to repeat myself, but please read my article where I address this specific point in considerable detail. 3. OK, here's a third "bonus" point: as for how often Sam Clemens heard the term "mark twain" when working on the lower Mississippi and what term he actually used at the time instead of "mark twain" those are not addressed in my article, but I know the answers and they are explained and amply documented in the text of my updated article on his nom de plume --but that won't be offered for publication until I have a couple of other articles put to bed. The answers may surprise you. Like so much of Twain's self-generated mythologies, the facts are at serious variance with the myth. Kevin @ Mac Donnell Rare Books 9307 Glenlake Drive Austin TX 78730 512-345-4139 Member: ABAA, ILAB ************************* You may browse our books at: www.macdonnellrarebooks.com -----Original Message----- From: Robert E. Stewart [log in to unmask] Sent: Monday, January 26, 2015 11:59 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: That bar tab story. We cannot ask Alf Doten himself, but we can check his diaries: In the 1960s, into the 1970s, author Walter Van Tilberg Clark heavily edited the diaries of Alf Doten into three volumes with a total of 2,224 pages, plus appendices and index, published by the University of Nevada Press. To the great frustration of historians in Nevada, the published pages represent perhaps a half of Doten's extensive files. From the entries about Twain, below, I think it is doubtful that Doten was the jokester creating the bar tab story. I also doubt that editor Clark omitted any mentions Doten made of Twain. After reading all the Twain entries in the Index, I append those I think you will agree make it highly unlikely that Doten gave enough time and attention to Twain to bother with creating the bar tab story. On Page 767 (Vol. 1), Doten wrote: Sunday, March 6, 1864. Clear & peasant. rose late. AM I went to Creoss's awhile. J.D. Winters introduced me to "Mark Twain" --had pleasant little chat with him.... [no further mention that day of Twain.] Then on March 4, Doten, who is living in the mining camp of Como, some distance from Virginia City, writes: ...Evening stage brought a noted correspondent of the Territorial Enterprise who writes under the"nomme de plume" of "Mark Twain." His name is Samuel Clements. [sic] The next mention is on page 830, (Vol 2) 1865: Sunday, April 9. ...Went to Sutterleys -- took my portrait twice--small cards, and one big picture to hang up in the gallery with Mark Twain and Dan DeQuille. [Sutterley's is a photo emporium.] Page 900 1866: "Mark Twain" (Sam Clemens) arrived this evening from California. D. E. McCarthy, one of the former proprietors of the Enterprise came with him. There are other, later, mentions of Twain, but none pertinent to this discussion. Bob Stewart Carson City