My Experience at Mark Twain Cave

[bishopnl]

This past weekend, my nephew was having his dedication service in Quincy, IL, where my brother attends church.  Quincy is about 30 minutes from Hannibal, MO, the boyhood home of Mark Twain and the inspiration for his novels about Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.  So my wife and I decided to go up Friday night and stay in a Bed and Breakfast in hannibal, and spend Saturday checking out some of the historical/literary aspects that the town has.  I had seen them before, but it's been a while.  (btw, Hannibal is also the hometown of Unsinkable Molly Brown, from the Titanic).

Anyway, so Saturday morning we went to Mark Twain's cave, which was the inspiration for the cave that Tom and Becky got lost in in the Adventures of Tom Sawyer.  The tour of the cave is about 55 minutes or so, and they have guided tours every half an hour or so.  Also, by way of reference, the cave was also a hideout of Jesse James (or so they say), and he even carved his name in the cave wall.  I've seen the name, but they no longer allow visitors into that part of the cave due to some vandalism incident with high schoolers a few years ago.

So our tour guide takes us through the cave, and she was pretty friendly, engaging, etc.  The cave has a lot of interesting points, and of course, they show you all the Tom Sawyer related material, like "Number 2 under the cross" where Injun Joe hid his loot.  There are also bats in there, and a lot of interesting geological information.  Anyway, at the end of the tour, the guide was talking about Jesse James (due to his name being carved in the wall).  She refers to Bob and Charley Ford, and how they assassinated James, and were subsequently pardoned by Gov. Thomas Crittenden.  So far so good.  But then, she launches into this story about how Bob was found dead, shot in the back, 3 days after he was pardoned, and Charley had disappeared.  And so most people believe Charley shot his brother because of some emotional attachment he had to Jesse James.

Of course, I'm standing there knowing that the entire story is a fabrication.  Charley Ford killed himself almost two years after he was pardoned.  Bob Ford was killed by Edward O'Kelley in Colorado 10 years after he was pardoned, and 8 years after Charley shot himself.  Mark Twain's cave is a registered national landmark.  How in the world could a tour guide get such a relatively simple piece of well known history so grossly distorted?  There are gift shops all over Hannibal with books about Jesse James and Bob Ford with this information right there. 

I shudder to think of all the school field trips taking place there in the spring, where kids are hearing all sorts of nonsense instead of the truth.  I didn't say anything at the time, but I did send them an email afterwards...lol...How can you believe anything they say?  For all I know, she might have been making everything up...lol...

[Sis]

Been there. Liked it.

Speaking of guides telling stories "out of school" there was this tour guide that I had when I worked for the museum.  He was ok with his information but liked to add things. One day I was listening around a corner where he couldn't see me and I heard him.

He was doing the Christmas thing. We had over 30 Christmas trees for "Christmas Around the World" exhibit. Knowing there are also a lot of Jewish kids, we did a Hannakuh window. He was telling about the story relating to it. Then he told about the dradel game and then he ended with... "And that is how gambling came to America!" 

I didn't use him much anymore after that.