What do Tom Sawyer and Jumping Frogs have in common? Stories about both of them were created by one man: Mark Twain. Twain was four years old when his family moved to Hannibal, Missouri, located on the west bank of the Mississippi. Twain grew up there and was fascinated with (......) life along the river----the steamboats, the giant lumber rafts, and the people who worked on them.

The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County is one of Twain's best loved short stories, and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is one of his most famous novels. Both these works are celebrated by events held during National Tom Sawyer Days, which originated in the late 1950s and became national in the 1960s. Children enter their frogs in the jumping contest during National Tom Sawyer Days. There's also a fence painting contest to see who can paint the fastest. The idea for this contest comes from a scene in Tom Sawyer, in which Tom has been told to paint the fence in front of the house he lives in. It's a beautiful day, and he would rather be doing anything else. As his friends walk by, he makes them believe that it's fun to paint, and they join in the "fun". By the end of the day, the fence has three coats of paint!

Although the story of Tom Sawyer is a fiction, it's based on facts. If you go to Hannibal, you'll see the white fence, which still stands at Twain's boyhood home.

Answer the following questions:
1. What's one of Mark Twain's most popular novels?
2. What else is celebrated in National Tom Sawyer Days?
3. Is it an official holiday?
4. Where?
5. When did it become official?
6. What days is the holiday held on?
7. What's an example of a thing that people do to celebrate it?
8. Anything else?
9. Is Tom Sawyer a real person?
10. Did he live in Missouri?
11. Did he enjoy painting?
12. Did he like frogs?
13. Is he based on a real person?
14. Who?
15. What did Twain like about his home?
16. How old was he when he started living there?
17. When was he born?
1. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
2. The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
3. Yes
4. Missouri
5. The 1960s
6. unknown
7. Children enter their frogs in jumping contests.
8. Fence painting contest
9. No
10. unknown
11. No
12. unknown
13. Yes
14. Mark Twain
15. Life along the river
16. Four
17. unknown