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appearance--as a kind of symbol of hope, maybe--a token of that
Sellers-optimism which dominated his early life, and was never
entirely subdued.
No other writing of any kind has been preserved from Sam Clemens's
boyhood, none from that period of his youth when he had served his
apprenticeship and was a capable printer on his brother's paper, a
contributor to it when occasion served. Letters and manuscripts of
those days have vanished--even his contributions in printed form are
unobtainable. It is not believed that a single number of Orion
Clemens's paper, the Hannibal Journal, exists to-day.
It was not until he was seventeen years old that Sam Clemens wrote a
letter any portion of which has survived. He was no longer in
Hannibal. Orion's unprosperous enterprise did not satisfy him.
His wish to earn money and to see the world had carried him first to
St. Louis, where his sister Pamela was living, then to New York
City, where a World's Fair in a Crystal Palace was in progress.
The letter tells of a visit to this great exhibition. It is not
complete, and the fragment bears no date, but it was written during
the summer of 1853.
Fragment of a letter from Sam L. Clemens to his sister Pamela Moffett,
in St. Louis, summer of 1853:
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