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Samuel Langhorne Clemens is born in Florida, the sixth child of John Marshall and Jane Lampton Clemens
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The Clemens family moves to Hannibal, Missouri, a riverbank town that is a frequent stop for steamboats traveling the Mississippi. Young Samuel reveres the riverboat pilots and hopes to become one himself
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John Clemens dies, forcing the family into financial hardship
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At the age 15, mark leaves school and works a a printer
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Samuel Clemens begins a successful two-year apprenticeship to become a licensed river pilot.
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Twain's youngest brother Henry is killed tragically at the age of 20 in an explosion on the steamboat Pennsylvania.
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The short story "Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog" appears in the New York Times
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Mark Twain's first book, The Innocents Abroad, becomes a bestseller.
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Twain marries Olivia Langdon, who becomes an important editor of his work.
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Langdon is born
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Twain publishes the satiric novel The Gilded Age, its title giving a name to an entire era of American history.
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Clara is born
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The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is published
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Pudd'nhead Wilson, Twain's last novel, is published. After ten difficult years, Twain's publishing house, Charles L. Webster & Co., finally goes belly-up.
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Mark Twain dies at the age of 74 at his home in Redding, Connecticut.
