Newsletter

Tuesday at Noon

Tuesday, October 18 at 12pm ET - MTH&M and Connecticut Funeral Directors Association (CFDA) present a virtual lunchtime conversation on ALL THE LIVING AND THE DEAD: From Embalmers to Executioners, an Exploration of the People Who Have Made Death Their Life’s Work with author Hayley Campbell and CFDA’s Jesse M. Gomes, a licensed funeral director/embalmer and educator. (Virtual)

We are surrounded by death. It is in our news, our nursery rhymes, our true-crime podcasts. Yet from a young age, we are told that death is something to be feared. How are we supposed to know what we’re so afraid of, when we are never given the chance to look? Fueled by a childhood fascination with death, journalist Hayley Campbell searches for answers in the people who make a living by working with the dead. Along the way, she encounters mass fatality investigators, embalmers, and a former executioner who is responsible for ending sixty-two lives. She meets gravediggers who have already dug their own graves, visits a cryonics facility in Michigan, goes for late-night Chinese with a homicide detective, and questions a man whose job it is to make crime scenes disappear. Through Campbell’s incisive and candid interviews with these people who see death every day, she asks: Why would someone choose this kind of life? Does it change you as a person? And are we missing something vital by letting death remain hidden?

FREE virtual event! LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE. 

Wednesday

Wednesday, October 19 at 7pm ET - Virtual Gallery Talk: RACE, SLAVERY & WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE with Printmakers' Network of Southern New England Artists (Virtual) 

Join MTH&M's Dr. Erin Bartram as she talks with Carol FitzSimonds, Lisa Goddard, and Barbara Pagh about the themes, inspiration and techniques on view in The Evocative Mark Twain Inspires the Printmakers Network of New England exhibit on view now through January 23, 2023.

Carol FitzSimonds will be talking about how Mark Twain’s work Letters from the Earth led her to create 3 books, which took her over a year to take from inspiration to concept, to design, and finally to the execution. 

Elizabeth Goddard will talk about how she arrived at her concept for HER quilt after reading Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, what deliberate design decisions, techniques and images went into its production and why Twain’s quote is relevant today.

Barbara Pagh states, “In this set of one-of-a-kind prints I worked with the quotation, images of Isabella Beecher ****** and Mark Twain, and a decorative pattern from the foyer of the Mark Twain House.”

Virtual event. Tickets: $5 per stream. LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE.

Coming Next

Monday, October 24 at 7pm ET - CALLING THE SPIRITS: A History of Seances with Lisa Morton and MTH&M's Mallory Howard (Virtual)

Calling the Spirits?investigates the eerie history of our conversations with the dead, from necromancy in Homer’s?Odyssey?to the emergence of Spiritualism—when Victorians were entranced by mediums and the seance was born. Among our cast are the Fox sisters, teenagers surrounded by “spirit rappings”; Daniel Dunglas Home, the “greatest medium of all time”; Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose unlikely friendship was forged, then riven, by the afterlife; and Helen Duncan, the medium whose trial in 1944 for witchcraft proved more popular to the public than news about the war. The book also considers Ouija boards, modern psychics, and paranormal investigations, and is illustrated with engravings, fine art (from beyond), and photographs. Hugely entertaining, it begs the question: is anybody there . . . ? 

FREE virtual event! LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE. 

Join Us!

Friday, November 4 at 6pm: The Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award Celebration presented by David Baldacci and Bank of America. In-person event!

The 2022 Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award honors an exemplary work of fiction from the previous calendar year that speaks with an “American Voice” about American experiences, much like Twain’s masterwork, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. From 60 eligible titles published in 2021 submitted for consideration this year, the winning work of fiction will be chosen this fall. You can see the four finalists here.

Join us on November 4th at our celebration dinner to recognize a modern voice that’s defining our current America. The award will be presented by bestselling author and former trustee of The Mark Twain House & Museum, David Baldacci, and excerpts of the winning book will be read by the author.

For ticket and sponsorship information, please contact our Development Office.

Book Your Visit!

Plan your visit to America's Best House Museum (Forbes Magazine, 2021) by CLICKING HERE.

Upcoming Events
V = Virtual Event; IP = In-Person Event

October 13 - Over My Dead Body: The Hidden History of America's Cemeteries with Greg Melville (V)

October 18 - MTH&M & Connecticut Funeral Directors Association present All the Living and the Dead: From Embalmers to Executioners, an Exploration of the People Who Have Made Death Their Life's Work with Hayley Campbell (V)

October 19 - Virtual Gallery Talk with Printmakers' Network of Southern New England (V)

October 20 - Classic Monsters Unleashed! with horror writer panel (V)

October 24 - Calling the Spirits: A History of Seances with Lisa Morton (V)

October 25 - Stay True - A Memoir by Hua Hsu (V)

October 27 - Tesla: Wizard at War -The Genius, The Particle Beam Weapon, and the Pursuit of Power with Marc J. Seifer (V)

November 1 - MTH&M and Amistad Center present Beatrice's Ledger: Growing Up in the Jim Crow South with Dr. Ruth Martin and Dr. Vivian Martin (IP)

November 3 - Retail Gangster: The INSANE, Real-Life Story of CRAZY EDDIE with Gary Weiss (V)

November 4 - Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award Celebration (IP)

November 7 - My Government Means to Kill Me with Rasheed Newson (V)

November 8 - Virtual Gallery Talk with Printmakers' Network of Southern New England (V)

November 10 - H.W. Brands on The Last Campaign: Sherman, Geronimo and the War for America (V)

November 15 - This Victorian Life: Modern Adventures in Nineteenth-century Culture, Cooking, Fashion, and Technology with Sarah and Gabriel Chrisman (V)

November 17 - The MTH&M and the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum present a lunchtime conversation with Women of the American West with Katie Hickman and April White (V)

November 29 - Amistad Center & MTH&M present The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family with Kerri K. Greenidge (V)

December 1 - Amistad Center & MTH&M present Radical Lives: Four Abolitionists with Linda Hirshman and Lydia Moland (V)

December 7 - The Trouble Begins at Home: Susy Clemens' Final Years (V)

December 8 - Requiem for the Massacre: A Black History on the Conflict, Hope, and Fallout of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre with RJ Young (V)

December 12 - Peniel E. Joseph on The Third Reconstruction: America's Struggle for Racial Justice in the Twenty-First Century (V)

December 13 - The Magi: Who They Were, How They've Been Remembered, and Why They Still Fascinate with Eric Vanden Eykel (V)

More to be announced soon!

To see all event information and registration, CLICK HERE.

To preorder books for our upcoming events, CLICK HERE. Signed books will be mailed after the event. Please note that we cannot ship outside of the U.S. at this time.

Your donation to The Mark Twain House & Museum helps us meet our mission to preserve the home and legacy of Mark Twain. Thank you for your generosity!

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