Black Fire: The True Story of the Original Tom Sawyer Read online

  Utley, Robert M. Lone Star Justice. New York: Berkley Books, 2003.

  Walkins, T.H., and R.R. Olmsted. Mirror of the Dream: An Illustrated History of San Francisco. San Francisco: Scrimshaw Press, 1976.

  Williams, Mary Floyd. History of the San Francisco Committee of Vigilance of 1851. Herbert Botton, editor. Vol. 12. (Lists minutes of the Executive Committee for July 21, 1851, and comments by George E. Schenck on the fate of Ben Lewis.)

  Newspapers and Periodicals

  “Parker House, City Intelligence.” Daily Alta California, May 4, 1851.

  “Terrible Conflagration! Loss About $5,000,000.” Daily Alta California, May 4, 1851.

  “The Conflagration.” Daily Alta California, May 5, 1851.

  “Reflections after the Event.” Daily Alta California, May 6, 1851.

  “The Spirit of Lynch Law.” Daily Alta California, June 4, 1851. (Mentions Ben Lewis.)

  “Another Conflagration!! Ten Squares Burned. Loss Three Millions of Dollars!!” Daily Alta California, June 23, 1851.

  “The effects of the Conflagration.” Daily Alta California, June 24, 1851.

  “Dinner to Captain Wakeman.” Daily Alta California, July 27, 1851.

  “Resignation of Captain Wakeman.” Daily Alta California, October 5, 1851.

  “The Wakeman Testimonial.” Daily Alta California, March 9, 1853.

  “Natchez.” Sacramento Daily Union, September 6, 1856, vol. 11, no. 1700.

  “Natchez reports theft.” Sacramento Daily Union, February 19, 1857, vol. 12, no. 1841.

  “My Brother, Henry Clemens …” Memphis Eagle and Enquirer, June 16, 1858.

  “Natchez the Pistol Man.” Sacramento Daily Union, September 25, 1858, vol. 16, no. 2339.

  “David C. Broderick Biography.” Sacramento Daily Union, September 17, 1859, vol. 17, no. 2644.

  “Death of Senator Broderick.” Sacramento Daily Union, September 19, 1859, vol. 18, no. 2645.

  Brady, Matthew. “The Torch Boys,” October 29, 1990. San Francisco Independent column “The Old Town,” p. 20.

  Mark Twain columns in the San Francisco Daily Morning Call: “A Trip to the Cliff House,” June 25, 1864; “Police Court,” July 12, 1864; “The County Prison,” July 17, 1864; “The Police Court Besieged,” July 22, 1864; “Fire at Hayes Valley,” August 18, 1864.

  Mark Twain: “Terrible Calamity, Explosion of the Steamer Washoe’s Boilers. One Hundred Wounded,” San Francisco Daily Morning Call, September 7, 1864.

  “Thomas Sawyer was run over by a hook and ladder truck and seriously injured.” San Francisco Call, April 23, 1869.

  “The Coyote Hill Duel,” reporter James O’Meara’s eyewitness account of Billy Mulligan and Jimmy Douglass’s shoot-out. San Francisco Call, December 25, 1881.

  Moulder, A. J. “Broderick’s Moral Courage.” Argonaut 3, no. 24 (1878): 9–12. “Worked the Brakes, Some of the Old Boys Who Ran With ‘the Machine’ in Days Long Ago.” San Francisco Call, January 3, 1888. (Includes drawing of Tom Sawyer in fire helmet as the first vice president.)

  “Tom Sawyer organizes a society for passage of bill to make the City Force a metropolitan one with a fully paid force.” San Francisco Call, October 13, 1890.

  “Tom Sawyer described as over 60 years old, hale and hardy, hails from New York.” San Francisco Call, September 16, 1890.

  “Sawyer comes to aid of recently discharged fireman.” San Francisco Call, October 13, 1890, vol. 67, no. 135.

  “Discharged Firemen. Tom Sawyer was not in a position to lose by the new movement.” Daily Alta California, October 17, 1890, vol. 83, no. 109.

  “The History of a Pistol.” Daily Alta California, April 21, 1891, vol. 84, no. 111.

  “Among Firemen. Tom Sawyer seeks job of Fire Commissioner.” San Francisco Call, August 17, 1891, vol. 70, no. 78. (Includes ink drawing of Chief Scannell.)

  “Old-Time Firemen, Pioneer Firefighters Meeting, Tom Sawyer, corporation-yard keeper.” San Francisco Call, August 31, 1891, vol. 70, no. 92.

  “Veteran Firemen Association.” San Francisco Call, September 16, 1891.

  “Supervisors petitioned to make Sawyer Fire Commissioner.” San Francisco Call, November 8, 1891.

  “Our Firemen. Tom Sawyer sings. Celebrates Tom Sawyer’s Birthday.” San Francisco Call, January 2, 1892, vol. 71, no. 32.

  “Vet’s Election.” San Francisco Call, January 18, 1892, vol. 71, no. 49. (Tom Sawyer, Jr., the ex-secretary speaks.)

  “The Veteran Firemen’s Association of California,” Sacramento Daily Union, September 20, 1893, vol. 86, no. 26.

  “Veteran Firemen. Tom Sawyer runs in race.” San Francisco Call, June 17, 1894, vol. 76, no. 17.

  “Veteran Firemen, Vocal Solo by Tom Sawyer.” San Francisco Call, May 23, 1895, vol. 77, no. 164.

  “The Real Tom Sawyer, Living in This City and Doing Business on Mission Street.” San Francisco Call, July 14, 1895, vol. 78, no. 44. (Sawyer and his friend Mannix meet Twain coming out of Russ House and spend the night drinking.)

  “Billy Mulligan Dies (a review).” San Francisco Call, September 30, 1895, vol. 78, no. 122.

  “He took morphine, aged bartender asks for Tom Sawyer’s help.” San Francisco Call, January 29, 1896, vol. 79, no. 60.

  “Jumped into the Sea, Thomas Sawyer is an old acquaintance of Mark Twain, and it was from him the name of ‘Tom Sawyer’ was taken.” Sacramento Daily Union, March 15, 1897, vol. 81, no. 105.

  “Old Friends Picnic.” Daily Alta California, May 31, 1898, vol. 83, no. 183.

  Viola Rodgers Interview. “Here is the Original of Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer.” San Francisco Call, October 23, 1898, vol. 84, no. 145, pp. 25–26 (Long article with drawn illustrations of the literary Tom Sawyer and the original Tom Sawyer. “He prides himself upon being a member of the first volunteer fire company ever formed in California.”)

  “Old Time Firemen, Tom Sawyer sings ‘On the Rocky Road to Dublin.’ San Francisco Call, January 27, 1899.

  New York Herald, “Mark Twain’s Reunion,” June 15, 1902. (Who is the real Tom Sawyer? “Town’s full of ’em,” Twain said. “They are not absolute portraits of any one person. Some of the incidents accredited to Tom Sawyer happened to one and some to another and some not at all.”)

  “Mark Twain interview.” New York American Journal, March 18, 1906, p. 10. (“There is more than a dozen real Tom Sawyers and Huck Finns have succumbed in the past twenty years.”)

  “Tom Sawyer, Whose Name Inspired Twain, Dies at Great Age.” San Francisco Call, October 1, 1906, vol. 100, no. 123, p. 1. (Includes photo of Tom Sawyer.)

  “Tom Sawyer’s Will Filed.” San Francisco Call, October 19, 1906, vol. 100, no. 141.

  Twain, Mark. “Chapters from my Autobiography” (North American Review, October 1907).

  “Henry Clemens.” Sunday magazine, March 29, 1908. (With illustration of Twain at his dying brother’s bedside.)

  “Illustration of Mark Twain at his dying brother’s bedside.” Sunday magazine, March 29, 1908. (Letters and citations from the Twain Project at the University of California, Berkeley.)

  Perrigan, Dana. “Beneath the City.” San Francisco Examiner, March 16, 1998, p. A-1 and p. A-10.

  Bancroft Library, University of California at Berkeley, http://bancroft.berkeley.edu. Guardians of the City, the Firemen’s Museum (which now has a Tom Sawyer exhibit): www.guardiansofthecity.org/​sffd/​companies/​volunteer/.

  The Mark Twain Project at the University of California at Berkeley is a magnificent depository of everything about Twain, including his letters, manuscripts, and biographical notes: www.marktwainproject.org.

  See also the Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco, “Tom Sawyer,” www.theshipslist.com/​ships/​passengerlists/, and San Francisco: Ships in Port, www.maritimeheritage.org/inport.htm. See San Francisco Fire Department Museum, 655 Presidio Avenue, San Francisco, CA, 9415-2424; the fire engines of 1850–1866 are on display there.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ROBERT GRAYSMITH
is the New York Times bestselling author of Zodiac and The Sleeping Lady as well as other books. His books have been made into the major motion pictures Zodiac and Auto Focus. A San Francisco Chronicle political cartoonist and artist for fifteen years, he lives in San Francisco.