When Samuel L. Clemens, in his dotage, made a surprise visit to his hometown of Hannibal, Missouri, one of his first stops was his boyhood home. At the time of the visit (1902), the Twain house was a nondescript rental property. But no more than two years after his death in 1910, the home had been purchased and set up as a lasting memorial.
A local lawyer, George A. Mahan, bought the Twain home and, on May 15, 1912, turned it over to the city of Hannibal. At the dedication, Mahan said he was offering the house "with the hope and in the full belief that it will be maintained and used, as to be an inspiration to them, to the people of Missouri and to the world as well."
Known as the greatest humorist of his day, and the author of charming children's books, Clemens had been beloved and mourned by all civilized people. But the real Mark Twain, we now know, was filled with invective and bile, directed mainly against God. Mark's latter years were filled with countless tragedies, bankruptcies and deaths, but all the while, he was careful to keep pulling a clown face before the American public. Mark knew that fame was a fine and fleeting thing, and therefore he kept his real thoughts hidden away in essays and stories to be released decades after his passing.
If Mark Twain had a successor, it was likely H.L. Mencken, though with one important difference. While, like Twain, obsessed with fame, Mencken had no intention of keeping his controversial opinions to himself. This naturally made Mencken countless enemies among the same politicos, puritans and clergymen Twain had so assiduously courted. But no matter. Mencken had bigger fish to fry. And as a writer of satiric, philosophical and political essays, Mencken was easily Twain's peer, if not his better.
This, then, is the tale of two houses. Unlike Clemens, who spent a great deal of his adulthood cold and homesick in European hotels, Mencken lived nearly his entire career in a narrow three-story house in a crowded, lower middle class Baltimore neighborhood. The home was one of thousands constructed in the late 19th century, when Baltimore developers were determined to put up the most economic residences possible, and so crammed rowhouses along every avenue and alley in the district.
When Henry Mencken died in 1956, his brother August remained in residence at 1524 Hollins Street, but at August's death, the home was bequeathed to the University of Maryland, which seemed reluctant to acknowledge the gift, if not somewhat ashamed, and was only too happy to swap it to the city of Baltimore in 1983, for the Old Pine Street Station. It was generally assumed that the Mencken house, picturesquely overlooking Union Square, would become a city museum, a Mecca for not only literati and libertarians, but the masses at large, much like Mark Twain's Hannibal home, which, though a ways off the beaten track, manages to draw upwards of 90,000 visitors a year, including a good many who have read nothing of Mark. Mencken himself had his doubts. His brother once said that Henry had a "special horror" of the thought that when he died the house would be wrecked. The Sage of Baltimore was not far wrong.
For a dozen years the city half-heartedly managed the home as the poor stepchild of the City Life Museum District, where it suffered neglect due to diminished funding, curtailed and unspecified hours, and even the absence of a curator. A few scholars, a journalist or two, a satiric essayist and his mistress may have made the pilgrimage to the home, but generally attendance was poor. It seemed that in the hearts of the American people, Mencken was no Twain. Nor were there any cute, picture-perfect freckled river waifs roaming Hollins Street – only a few yuppies arguing with renovating contractors, and, inside the Hollins Street address, the cynical ghost of an unrepentant atheist, a cigar in one hand, a pilsner in the other. The home was allowed to deteriorate, and, in 1997, finally shuttered – seemingly for good.
Though HLM's popularity has waned steadily since the 1920s, there has always been a core constituency of devotees who remained charmed and provoked by the master's style, wit, intellectual honesty, brazenness, and courage. A handful of these formed The Mencken Society in 1976, which now claims 375 members. A few devotees host Mencken web sites, and a handful make the annual haj to the Mencken Room at the Enoch Pratt Free Library for "Der Tag," the one day the room is accessible to the mob, per HLM's command. Last, a few hardcore Menckenites have set themselves the task of purchasing and restoring the Mencken Home and reopening it as a museum. The Friends of the H.L. Mencken House counts among its supporters such big-money names as Russell Baker, Paul Fussell, William Manchester, David McCullough, Gore Vidal, Lewis Lampham, and, inexplicably, Rocky Horror Picture Show starlet Susan Sarandon. The Friends' goal is to put Mencken's House back in order, both structurally and financially, so that it may once again become the setting of intellectual roughhousings and boozings as it was so often during the first half of the 20th century.
Of his home, Mencken once wrote, "I have lived in one house in Baltimore for nearly 45 years. It has changed in that time, as I have – but somehow it still remains the same…. It is as much a part of me as my two hands. If I had to leave it I’d be as certainly crippled as if I lost a leg." Happily, Mencken was able to remain in his home until the angels fetched him to his eternal abode. Like Lincoln, Mencken now belongs to the ages, but his home remains the "surplus property" of the city of Baltimore.
Not long ago, while passing through the southern Illinois village of Salem, I was possessed with the strange desire to stop at the boyhood home of William Jennings Bryan, a curiosity I must have overlooked a half-dozen times before. The home was nearly empty, though well kept, much like the man himself. The curator, a recent college graduate, didn't appear to hold a very high opinion of "The Great Commoner," but then there weren't that many jobs for history majors in Salem. I suggested she read Mencken's incomparable essay "In Memoriam, W.J.B." in which HLM eulogizes one of the biggest frauds ever to bestride the American scene. The curator had never heard of Mencken, but assured me she would read the essay. "I have lots of time to read," she said. "We don't get many visitors."
I suggested she capture some of the local urchins and fix them up in period costumes toting signs that read "Free Silver" or whatnot. It seemed like the sort of thing Henry would say.
But I don't think my history major got the joke.
H.L. Mencken House Color photo by Jeff Joeckel, National Register of Historic Places.
Christopher Orlet is an essayist, journalist and book critic. His work appears often in The American Spectator Online, the London Guardian, and Salon.com. Visit his home page here.
