Product Code Database
Clara Langhorne Clemens Samossoud (formerly Gabrilowitsch; June 8, 1874 – November 19, 1962), was an American concert singer, and the daughter of Samuel Clemens, who wrote as Mark Twain. She managed his estate and guarded his legacy after his death as his only surviving child. She was married first to Ossip Gabrilowitsch, then to Jacques Samossoud after Gabrilowitsch's death. She wrote biographies of Gabrilowitsch and of her father. In her later life, she became a Christian Scientist.
, Ossip Gabrilowitsch, Jean Clemens, Joseph Twichell.]]
Clemens went for a sleigh ride on December 20, 1908, with Russian concert pianist Ossip Gabrilowitsch who was staying with her father at his residence "Innocents at Home" in Redding, Connecticut.The house was later renamed Stormfield. " Mark Twain on 'Innocence at Home,' Grover Cleveland, and God," Shapell Manuscript Foundation, n.d. Retrieved June 12, 2018. The horse was frightened by a flapping newspaper and it bolted, causing Gabrilowitsch to lose control. The sleigh overturned at the top of a hill near a drop, throwing Clemens out. Gabrilowitsch saved both her and the horse from plunging over the edge, spraining an ankle in his exertions. He returned Clemens home unharmed except for the shock of the accident. Twain biographer Michael Shelden doubts the truth of this heroic tale and suggests that the story was planted in the press to quiet rumors that Clara was having an affair with Charles Wark, her former accompanist and a married man.Shelden, M.: Mark Twain: Man in White. Random House, 2010
Theodor Leschetizky was training Gabrilowitsch in Vienna in 1899, and he introduced him to Clemens. They were married on October 6, 1909, in the drawing room at Stormfield, the Clemens home, with her father's friend Rev. Joseph Twichell presiding. Her father said that the engagement was not new, having been "made and dissolved twice six years ago". He also said that the marriage was sudden because Gabrilowitsch had just recovered from a surgical operation which he had undergone in the summer and they were about to head off to their new house in Berlin where he would begin his European season.
Samuel Clemens died on April 21, 1910, leaving his estate to be equally divided between his surviving daughters in a will dated August 17, 1909. His daughter Jean Clemens died in the bathtub on December 24, 1909, after having an epileptic seizure. Clara inherited the entire estate, which provided quarterly payments of interest to keep it "free from any control or interference from any husband she may have." On July 9, Clara announced that she was donating her father's library of nearly 2,500 books to the Mark Twain Free Library.
On August 19, 1910, Clara's only child Nina was born at Stormfield. Nina Gabrilowitsch (1910–1966) was Twain's last descendant, and she died January 16, 1966, in a Los Angeles hotel. She had been a heavy drinker, and bottles of pills and alcohol were found in her room.
It was again produced in 1927, opening on April 12 for a series of special morning and afternoon performances at the Edyth Totten Theatre.
Gabrilowitsch was conductor of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra from 1918 until 1935, when he fell ill. He entered the Henry Ford Hospital on March 25, 1935, where he stayed until he was released to his home to convalesce on September 28. He died at home on September 14, 1936, age 58. Clara married Jacques Samossoud on May 11, 1944, a Russian-born symphony conductor 20 years her junior. They were married in her Hollywood home.
Clara explored eastern religions for several years before embracing Christian Science, but there are questions as to her seriousness and commitment to it. She wrote Awake to a Perfect Day on the subject, published in 1956. She also published biographies of her father ( My Father, Mark Twain in 1931) and of her first husband ( My Husband: Gabrilowitsch in 1938).The New York Times, November 21, 1962, transcribed on TwainQuotes. Retrieved November 27, 2020.
She objected in 1939 to the release of her father's Letters from the Earth, but she changed her stance and allowed them to be published shortly before her death on November 20, 1962.The New York Times, November 21, 1962, from TwainQuotes, op. cit. She prevented Charles Neider from including certain of her father's dictations from June 1906 (the 19th, 20th, 22nd, 23rd, and 25th) in the version of The Autobiography of Mark Twain that was in preparation into 1958.Charles Neider, The Autobiography of Mark Twain, introduction (noted from Blackstone Audio version).
|
|
