Here’s a 1888 B&M rail map: http://www.davidrumsey.com/maps900044-24538.html On Apr 8, 2015, at 3:33 PM, Scott Holmes <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Well Carl, I think your bit of insight provides a very significant > perspective on the culture and society at that time. I don't have a map > of the B&M railway lines in 1884 but I suspect you are correct. I would > expect that Urban Geographers would find much to consider here on > questions of the development of suburbs and the onset of workers as > commuters. I live in Los Angeles where there are very few trains for > commuting. There is actually only one that goes through the San > Fernando Valley. Many years ago, just before I acquired consciousness, > there was the Red Line which stretched all the way to Long Beach. You > can see an amusing take on what happened to it in the Roger Rabbit > movie. > > Anyway, this is just one example of why it is a good idea to study Mark > Twain. > > On Wed, 2015-04-08 at 14:46 -0400, Carl J. Chimi wrote: >> Gee, I saw it as perhaps the ONE thing on this list I could speak of with a >> tiny little bit of "authority". >> >> This may seem unbelievable to most people, especially in today's day and age >> when children are so sheltered and driven everywhere. When I was three, my >> cousin (who was six and knew everything) and I went to the B&M station at >> Summertime Lodge on Summer Street in Malden. We waited for a Buddliner >> train to stop and climbed up the ladder on its back end. Then we lay down >> on top of the train and watched the world go by. The train stopped a number >> of times, briefly, but ended up in Lowell, where we climbed down and waited >> for another train to go back to Malden. I had no idea where I was the whole >> time, and probably my cousin didn't, either. I only realized we had gone to >> Lowell more than 20 years later when my band went there to play a gig and I >> recognized the place I had been as a small child, as if from a dream. We >> actually made that trip two or three times. Our mothers, who had other >> children to worry about, never had the slightest idea. >> >> That world of almost 60 years ago is gone forever, and probably it's a good >> thing. But it's a nice boyhood memory to have, and it did give me a bit of >> knowledge of the trains in the Boston area. >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Mark Twain Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Scott Holmes >> Sent: Wednesday, April 8, 2015 2:25 PM >> To: [log in to unmask] >> Subject: Re: Twain, November 11, 1884 A letter to Pond >> >> See what happens when someone who has never been to a place starts blabbing >> about the place. Every so often I need to be reminded of the Geographer's >> dictum that the map is not the territory. >> >> On Wed, 2015-04-08 at 14:13 -0400, Carl J. Chimi wrote: >>> Why do you say that? I grew up in Malden, which is just south of >>> Melrose and maybe five miles or so north of Boston. Lowell is maybe >>> 25 miles north of Boston. It would have been relatively easy for >>> Twain to have spent the night after the Melrose gig to take a train >>> into Boston for a good hotel, and have penned and posted the letter from >> there. >>> >>> The point is that none of these places were more than an hour or so >>> away from each other by the B&M railroad, which I'm pretty sure >>> existed in those days and catered to people who worked in Boston but >>> commuted from cities and towns the trains had by then begun to turn >>> into suburbs. When I was young, the B&M ran from North Station in >>> Boston north through Malden and Melrose and on to Lowell, among other >>> destinations. I think that was true in the 1880s. The train run from >>> Melrose to Boston might have taken a half hour or so, and from Boston to >> Lowell maybe twice that. >>> >>> Carl >>> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> From: Mark Twain Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Scott >>> Holmes >>> Sent: Wednesday, April 8, 2015 1:56 PM >>> To: [log in to unmask] >>> Subject: Twain, November 11, 1884 A letter to Pond >>> >>> On this date Twain and Cable were in Lowell, MA for a show at >>> Huntington Hall. The day before they were in Melrose, MA, but there >>> is a letter from Twain to Pond dated November 11, 1884 from Boston, >>> MA. Given their geographic locations, it doesn't make much sense to >>> me for Sam Clemens to be in Boston on that date to post a letter. This is >> listed in MTP Fred Harwood Linwood Cottage Sheffield