The home where Mark Twain penned classics such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court may be shutting its doors to the public, as the nonprofit organization that has shaped the property into a cultural center has encountered what may be the final blows in a recent deluge of financial troubles, the New York Times reported yesterday. With the Mark Twain House and Museum expecting to fall short of their budget by nearly four hundred thousand dollars this fiscal year, and cash expected to run out in the next few weeks, significant gifts are necessary to help cover operating costs for the historic home in Hartford, Connecticut, a whimsical chalet built for Twain in 1874, situated next to the home of Harriet Beecher Stowe and the adjacent visitors' center.
The museum attributes part of the budget crisis to the 2003 addition of the visitors' center, the building of which amounted to nearly double the expected cost, and has left the organization with five million dollars of debt that prevents the borrowing of additional funds. Rising energy bills also put a marked strain on the museum. In order to cut costs, the staff has already been cut from forty-nine to seventeen, with several management positions eliminated.
The Mark Twain House and Museum, which projects a budget of $2.9 million for the fiscal year ending next January 31, receives roughly sixty thousand dollars annually from the state, and was awarded an additional $230,000 to help balance the museum's expected deficit. A freeze in the state's budget this year disabled any increases in funding. The museum also anticipates that the weak economy may diminish income generated by its visitors, especially as rising gas prices could deter larger tour groups from visiting the site. (Nearly fifteen thousand school children arrive by bus each year, a large fraction of the museum's eighty-three thousand annual visitors.)
Twain, whose remark "The lack of money is the root of all evil" appears on a wall in the museum's lobby, was himself forced to leave the house due to lack of finances. Shortly thereafter, however, he was able to bolster his assets on a European lecture tour. The museum is encouraging the community to contribute to a similar turn of events, again quoting Twain on their Web site: "The exercise of an extraordinary gift is the supremest pleasure in life."
The Mount, Edith Wharton's estate and gardens in Lenox, Massachusetts, is also facing fiscal hardships. Edith Wharton Restoration, Inc., the site's managing organization, must come up with three million dollars by October 31 in order to avoid foreclosure. Donations of over nine hundred thousand dollars have currently been raised.
