III 

111TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. RES. 690 

Commemorating the 175th anniversary of the birth of Mark Twain. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

NOVEMBER 30, 2010 

Mrs. MCCASKILL (for herself and Mr. BOND) submitted the following 

resolution; which was considered and agreed to 

RESOLUTION 

Commemorating the 175th anniversary of the birth of Mark 

Twain. 

Whereas Mark Twain was born with the name Samuel 

Langhorne Clemens on November 30, 1835, in Florida, 

Missouri, the 6th child of John Marshall and Jane 

Lampton Clemens; 

Whereas in 1839, the Clemens family moved to Hannibal, 

Missouri, the inspiration for the fictional town of St. Petersburg depicted in the novels ‘‘The Adventures of Tom 

Sawyer’’ and ‘‘Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’’, where 

the Clemens family lived until 1853, including several 

years of residence at 206 Hill Street, known as the boyhood home of Mark Twain; 

Whereas in 1848, Samuel Clemens left school to become a 

printer’s apprentice at the Missouri Courier newspaper, 


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•SRES 690 ATS 

his first in a series of occupations that include, most notably, author, but also, printer, typesetter, steamboat 

pilot, journalist, lecturer, publisher, editor, prospector, 

and political activist; 

Whereas while working at the Virginia City newspaper, the 

Territorial Enterprise, Clemens first used the pen name 

‘‘Mark Twain’’ in 1863; 

Whereas with the publication of the short story ‘‘Jim Smiley 

and His Jumping Frog’’ in The Saturday Press in 1865, 

Mark Twain experienced his first significant success as 

an author; 

Whereas in 1869, Twain’s first book, ‘‘The Innocents 

Abroad’’, was published, detailing Twain’s adventures 

through Europe and the Middle East; 

Whereas Samuel Clemens, known for the love and affection 

he demonstrated for his wife and family and to whom the 

quote, ‘‘What is a home without a child?’’, is attributed, 

in 1870 married Olivia Langdon, with whom he had 4 

children, Langdon, Olivia Susan, Clara Langdon, and 

Jane Lampton; 

Whereas the book ‘‘Roughing It’’, part autobiography and 

part tall tale, chronicling Twain’s adventures in the early 

American West and critiquing society’s treatment of Chinese Americans, was published in 1872; 

Whereas ‘‘The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today’’, a novel Twain 

wrote in collaboration with Charles Dudley Warner satirizing political corruption and greed in American life, was 

published in 1873; 

Whereas Twain’s novel, ‘‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’’, 

through which he sought ‘‘to pleasantly remind adults of 

what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and 


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thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they 

sometimes engaged in’’, was published in 1876; 

Whereas in 1881, Twain addressed class issues and attacked 

injustice and hypocrisy in English society with the publication of his novel, ‘‘The Prince and the Pauper’’; 

Whereas in 1883, ‘‘Life on the Mississippi’’, Twain’s book exploring the history and lore of the Mississippi River and 

detailing his time spent as a Mississippi River steamboat 

pilot, was published; 

Whereas Mark Twain’s most famous work, ‘‘Adventures of 

Huckleberry Finn’’, which attacked the institution of 

slavery, the failures of Reconstruction, and the continued 

mistreatment of African Americans in American society, 

and which is considered a masterpiece of American fiction and is widely known as one of the Great American 

Novels, was published in 1884; 

Whereas Twain’s powerful social critique, ‘‘A Connecticut 

Yankee in King Arthur’s Court’’, was published in 1889; 

Whereas ‘‘The Tragedy of Pudd’nhead Wilson’’, Twain’s 

strongest critique of racism and the institution of slavery, 

was published in 1894; 

Whereas on April 21, 1910, Samuel Clemens died at the age 

of 74; and 

Whereas the 175th anniversary of the birth of Mark Twain 

is an historic occasion: Now, therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the Senate commemorates the 175th 

2 anniversary of the birth of Mark Twain on November 30, 


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1 2010, and his enduring legacy as one of our Nation’s 

2 greatest authors and humorists. 

Æ 


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