nPostednon February 13, 2014
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Actually,nit was only half of a manuscript that went missing and was found. Butnit’s still a big deal, because the half-manuscript was ThenAdventures of Huckleberry
Actually,nit was only half of a manuscript that went missing and was found. Butnit’s still a big deal, because the half-manuscript was ThenAdventures of Huckleberry n
nFinn!
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nAndnit was the original manuscript, written and heavily edited by author Mark Twainnhimself, in his own handwriting!
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nAndnit even had some scenes and pages that had never been publishednbefore!
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nAndnit was missing for more than a century!
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Howndoes half an original manuscript or such value go missing for morenthan 100 years? Well, apparently lawyer James Fraser Gluck askednTwain to donate the manuscript to the Buffalo and Erie CountynLibrary, but Twain could only find one half of the manuscript. Henassumed the other half had been misplaced by the publishers, so inn1885 he mailed the half that he had to Gluck, and it was donated andnexhibited in the library. Two years later Twain found the first halfnand mailed it, as well, to Gluck.
Howndoes half an original manuscript or such value go missing for morenthan 100 years? Well, apparently lawyer James Fraser Gluck askednTwain to donate the manuscript to the Buffalo and Erie CountynLibrary, but Twain could only find one half of the manuscript. Henassumed the other half had been misplaced by the publishers, so inn1885 he mailed the half that he had to Gluck, and it was donated andnexhibited in the library. Two years later Twain found the first halfnand mailed it, as well, to Gluck.n
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nSomething—wendon’t know what—happened at this point. Perhaps Gluck was takingnthe pages to be bound in the same leather that the other half hadnbeen bound in. At any rate, Gluck put the missing-for-two-years firstnhalf of Huckleberry Finn into one of his trunks—and then hendied unexpectedly. And of course nobody knew where thenhalf-manuscript was, and it went missing AGAIN—this time for a lotnmore than two years!
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nEventually,nabout 103 years later, Gluck’s granddaughter, Barbara Gluck Testa,nopened up some trunks that had belonged to her long-deceased grandpa,nand she found the manuscript pages. Can you imagine the thrill shenmust’ve felt?
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Testansent it to Sotheby’s to make sure the pages were the “real deal,”nas a preparation to selling them. Sotheby’s estimated their value atn$1.5 million, but after they announced the discovery on this date inn1991, people from the Buffalo Library came forward with their claimnof ownership. There was a court hearing to determine who owned thenlong-lost pages. It was decided that Testa would give the pages tonthe library—so that they could be enjoyed by all—but that she wasnawarded a six-figure finder’s fee. (Which means that she was paid atnleast $100,000 for the pages—and maybe a lot more. But remember, itnwas worth a million dollars more than $500,000!!!)
Testansent it to Sotheby’s to make sure the pages were the “real deal,”nas a preparation to selling them. Sotheby’s estimated their value atn$1.5 million, but after they announced the discovery on this date inn1991, people from the Buffalo Library came forward with their claimnof ownership. There was a court hearing to determine who owned thenlong-lost pages. It was decided that Testa would give the pages tonthe library—so that they could be enjoyed by all—but that she wasnawarded a six-figure finder’s fee. (Which means that she was paid atnleast $100,000 for the pages—and maybe a lot more. But remember, itnwas worth a million dollars more than $500,000!!!)n
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nInthink this was a win-win. The two halves of the manuscript werenfinally reunited, Testa got a thrill and a nice chunk of change, thenlibrary got a precious artifact, and Mark Twain’s intentions werenfinally fulfilled!
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nAlsonon this date:
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Test pilot Chuck Yeager’s birthday
Test pilot Chuck Yeager’s birthday n
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nNaturalistnJoseph Banks’s birthday
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nAnniversarynof the Treaty of Lisbon
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nArtistnGrant Wood’s birthday
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nPlannahead:
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nChecknout my Pinterest boards for:
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nFebruaryn holidays
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nFebruaryn birthdays
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nAndnhere are my Pinterest boards for:
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nMarchn holidays
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