August 23, 2024
Our boat docked for five hours today at Hannibal, another old river town 
capitalizing on its past . Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher in their latest incarnations greeted us and directed us to the homes and people Sam Clemens made famous in his novels. Though he lived in 
the town only until the age 17 or 18 when he went on the river, eventually earning a captain’s license, his early years as a journalist eventually won out. The museum campus recreates ante bellum South, including uncle Dan, a slave who is featured in the novels. The recent novel, James, engagingly recreates Huck Finn told from 
the slave’s perspective. Seems hard to realize but Missouri was a slave state. There’s a new addition to the museum about Jim, that we didn’t get to. For a time after his father’s death. Clemens lived upstairs of Dr. Grant, a relative of Ulysses. That paid dividends in a friendship that culminated when the dying Grant penned his memoirs to pay off the debts he had incurred. Clemens published them. Hope our water depth measures at least Mark Twain. I think the Viking Mississippi draws 12 feet, and that’s “Mark Twain.”