Some game show has apparently asked the question "What was Samuel Clemens' Birthplace?"
People are being sent here from various search engines, due to a fluke in Google's algorithms.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born in Florida, Missouri on November 30, 1835. The family moved to Hannibal, Missouri a few years later. Hannibal is the town that Clemens made famous, so I'm assuming they're using this as a trick question.
Here's a pre-emptive strike..... "How did Samuel Clemens get the name Mark Twain?" And "What does the name Mark Twain mean?"
The "marks" were the strips woven into a depth sounding device used on steamboats. "Mark One" meant approximately six feet deep. "Mark Twain", twain meaning "two", meant twelve feet or "safe water". Click here for a full listing of the divisions of marks. Anyone who rode on a steamboat would've heard these terms shouted to the pilot throughout a river trip, so when Clemens needed a pen name, Mark Twain seemed like a natural choice.
Those who love psychobabble have wasted a lot of ink on Clemens picking a pseudonym that means safe but not too deep.
Now, back to our regular scheduled programming. I apologize for whoring for hits. And I would appreciate it if someone could comment on why people suddenly want to know where Sam Clemens was born.
3 comments:
because Rush Limbaugh brought it up on his show today...
(Rush is from Missouri and now lives in Florida....he told a caller, also from Missouri and now living in Florida, to look it up, that he'd be surprised)
Lordy, that man has some power.
yep....$400 million worth now, so I hear...
better him than a lot of others out there though.
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