This 1884 gelatin print—one of many oddities housed in the Mark Twain Papers and Project of the Bancroft Library—was likely made as a reference image for a sculptor who was working on a bust of the famous author. In the archivist’s clinically precise description, it depicts: “Clemens, Samuel, L. Front view of torso, three-quarter view of head. Naked.”
Naked, indeed. And surprisingly buff, even at age 48.
The bust itself was photographed and served as a frontispiece in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, published the same year.
Twain was friendly with the young sculptor, Karl Gerhardt, and his wife, Harriet. On their first meeting, “Hattie” insisted on showing him a topless sculpture of herself that Karl had made. Twain later wrote to a friend, “it will be many a long day before I run across another woman who can do the like & show no trace of self-consciousness.” As for Karl, Twain considered him so talented that he sent the 28-year-old to Paris and paid for three years of his artistic training.
The once-obscure photo has become a source of some amusement online, usually paired with one of Twain’s aphorisms: “Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence.” Fewer know the story of the author’s generosity—another topic Twain quipped about. “Never refuse to do a kindness unless the act would work great injury to yourself, and never refuse to take a drink—under any circumstances.”
