High History / Mark Twain

One hundred and fifty four years ago ( September 17, 1865 ), Tremenheere Lanyon Johns, who wrote "The Mouse-Trap Man" and Samuel Clemens, who had just begun to call himself "Mark Twain", have walked by Richards & Company, a #Hash store at the corner of Clay & Sansome streets in San Francisco, that sold Hasheesh Candy.

One day after, San Francisco Dramatic Chronicle, published this:

It appears that a "Hasheesh" mania has broken out among our Bohemians. Yesterday, Mark Twain and the "Mouse-Trap" were seen walking up Clay street under the influence of the drug, followed by a "star" [a policeman] who was evidently laboring under a misapprehension as to what was the matter with them.

So Who Was Mark Twain ?

• He is Samuel Langhorne Clemens, who was born in Florida, son of John Marshall Clemens and Jane Lampton Clemens sixth out of seven children. It is said he had an unhappy childhood. Only a brother and sister reached maturity.

• When Samuel was four, the family moved to Hannibal, a port city on the Mississippi River, which later served as inspiration for the fictional city of St. Louis. Petersburg from "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn".

• In 1847, when Twain was eleven, he worked as a disciple at a printer. At the age of sixteen he started writing Funny Articles & Sketches. Eighteen years old he left Hannibal, working as a printing press in New York, Philadelphia, St. Louis. Louis and Cincinnati.

• Twenty-two, Twain returned to Missouri. During a trip to New Orleans on the Mississippi River, the pilot of the ship, inspired Clemens to become a Paddock Pilot, and he continued to work as a pilot on the river until the outbreak of the Civil War in America.

• Arrived in Nevada, Twain became a Miner, hoping to get rich by discovering silver. He spent a lot of time in the mining camp with his comrades - another life experience he used in literary work. After the failure as a miner, he found work at a newspaper in Virginia City called the Daily Territorial Enterprise. There he began to use the literary pseudonym "Mark Twain".

Mark Twain's Hasheesh' Experience

Twain was so depressed about money before his he hit upon his marketable talent for humorous literature that he spoke of suicide. Throughout his youth, he was always looking for ways to get rich. He tried joining the Gold Rush as a miner, and in 1856 he attempted to travel to Brazil to start a business that flourishes today, importing coca. If he were around today, it’s not inconceivable that Twain might have taken part somehow in the new "Green Rush".

- In October 1865, one month after, Mark Twain was seen on Clay Street under the influence of Hash Candy, Twain wrote to his brother:

I have had a call to literature, of a low order — i.e. humorous. It is nothing to be proud of, but it is my strongest suit.

- In 1867, Twain described his first impression of Alcazar, palace of the Moorish kings, this way:

I cannot describe it. In my memory its courts & gardens will always be a hasheesh delusion, its Hall of Ambassadors a marvelous dream

- One year ater , his critique of a play called "The White Fawn" for Alta California concludes:

The final grand transformation scene is a vision of magnificence such as no man could imagine unless he had eaten a barrel of hasheesh.

Most likely, Mark Twain’s Hash habit launched his career as he turned to writing humor after meeting Fitz Hugh Ludlow, the author of The Hasheesh Eater in San Francisco!

Was Mark Twain Inspired By Eating Cannabis? What do you think !

Reference & Photos / Wikipedia / SF Gate / The Weed Blog /