Twainmania

In an e-mail recently, Faye Bleigh, executive director of the Hannibal Convention and Visitors Bureau, wrote, "The effects of Sept. 11 are probably the same here as most other small Midwest towns. We've heard some skepticism about travel plans. We saw a drop in numbers for about two weeks after, but things have returned to near normal."

Henry Sweets, director of the Boyhood Home and Museum, says he expects a "tremendous" number of people to watch the movie. "I would certainly anticipate that this would translate into people being willing to get into vehicles and go to those sites to tour them, so we certainly would hope to see an increase in our attendance next year," he says. "It's next to impossible to guess what kind of numbers that would translate into, but as we go back historically and look at major productions on Mark Twain that have come out, we can see a rise in attendance following those."

Woollen and others say the tourist season falls into three sections in Hannibal: school groups in the spring, families in the summer, seniors in motor coach groups in the fall.

"In November it's like they close the doors to Hannibal," Woollen says, though this year they won't close them before Ken Burns comes to visit on Nov. 10.

"He plans to show Hannibal folks that part of the documentary which was filmed in Hannibal," Bleigh says.

Hannibal will thaw and those doors will open up again, and the hordes will come. They'll crowd into the Boyhood Home, a two-story white-frame rectangle on Hill Street, two blocks from the levee, where they'll push little red buttons on the walls and hear Sweets explaining in his precise, careful manner what they're looking at.

After gazing at, no kidding, the whitewashed fence next to the house, they'll move along through a museum and gift shop to the Clemens Law Office across the street, where young Sam's father was justice of the peace; to the Pilaster House, where the family lived for a while during hard financial times; to "Becky Thatcher's" house, where Laura Frazier, the model for that character, grew up; and to Grant's Drug Store, where Mr. Smarr's body has long since been dragged away, but an interesting display of period medicines and doctor's implements remains.

They also might visit Rockcliffe Mansion, a well-known attraction unconnected to Twain, though he did visit there, or the birthplace of Margaret Tobin. A popular legend holds that when young Maggie was working as a waitress at a local hotel, Twain, dining there, advised her to go west to Colorado and marry a rich man, which she did. And that was just the first of her adventures, as you'd know if you ever saw "The Unsinkable Molly Brown."

And then -- perhaps after some knickknack shopping, a ride on the side-wheeler Mark Twain, a visit to the Mark Twain Cave and maybe a low-fat decaf triple mocha at the friendly but slightly out of place Java Jive on Main -- they'll pour into the New Mark Twain Museum, where they'll spend several days reading and discussing Twain esoterica and enjoying interactive displays revolving around his books.

Well, maybe not several days.

"One has to consider that a person coming to visit the Mark Twain Museum has probably budgeted a certain amount of time that they're comfortable in spending at the museum," Sweets says. That might be an hour and a half for the casual, non-scholar tourist. "We have to just hit high points and try to provide material for the visitor who wants to go beyond that."

At the moment, there are displays having to do with "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer," "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "Roughing It" and Twain's other writings on the West. By next spring -- a happy accident of timing, Sweets says -- there will be three new displays, on "Life on the Mississippi," "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" and "The Innocents Abroad."

The idea is to use the limited space -- the new museum, two blocks down the street from the tiny original museum, is still only a modest, two-story storefront -- to show that Twain wrote more than just pastoral tales of his Mississippi River youth. "We think as they come through, most of the visitors have heard of 'Tom Sawyer' and heard of 'Huckleberry Finn,' whether or not they've read them," Sweets says. "When they reach 'Life on the Mississippi,' again, I think they're familiar with the title of the book. For the three other books, I think we're exposing them to writings that the average visitor will not be that familiar with, and our goal is to try to show this breadth of Mark Twain's writing."

It's an admirable goal, and the museum does nice work. But in an ordinary year, it wouldn't be enough to convince the kids to go along with Dad's big idea for a lit vacation.

Next page: Elle magazine declares Twain hot, hot, hot!