Twain, Mark, House - Hartford, Connecticut
Posted by: 
Hikenutty
N 41° 46.068 W 072° 41.444
18T E 691947 N 4626573
This is the beloved Connecticut home that Mark Twain had built for his family. He said that his happiest times were spent at this place. The building is now a museum and open for public tours.
Waymark Code: WMZZG
Location: Connecticut, United States
Date Posted: 11/27/2006
Views: 57
The Twain house is defined mostly by the variety and unpredictability of its elements. No two elevations are alike; various chimneys and towers rise spontaneously in contrast to the calming, broad sweep of the deep porches.
This commitment to experimentation can also be seen in the exotic interiors designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany and his partners in Associated Artists. Cultures and styles from around the globe are celebrated in the dense network of pattern, texture, and color throughout the first floor of the house. Northern Africa, the Far East and India are woven together in an elegant eclecticism that helped set a new standard for the Gilded Age.
New technologies were also employed that included a gravity flow heat system, split flues to allow for windows over two fireplaces, and seven bathrooms with flush toilets. In addition, Twain was both proud of, and flummoxed by, his telephone, one of the very first installed in a private home.
Mark Twain and his family enjoyed what the author would later call the happiest and most productive years of his life in their Hartford home. Twain wrote: "To us, our house . . . had a heart, and a soul, and eyes to see us with; and approvals and solicitudes and deep sympathies; it was of us, and we were in its confidence and lived in its grace and in the peace of it benediction."
The Mark Twain House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1963. The restoration was largely completed for the house's centennial in 1974. This early preservation of a Victorian home set the stage for, and encouraged, similar projects throughout the nation. In 1977, the National Trust for Historic Preservation honored the museum with the David E. Finley Award for "exemplary restoration."
The Museum is open Monday through Saturday 9:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m. and Sunday 12 - 5:30 p.m. The cost is $13 for adults, $11 for Seniors, and $8 for children ages 6-16. Under age 6 is free.