07/06/2021
Helen Keller forged an unlikely friendship with Mark Twain that lasted well over a decade (until his death in 1910). Keller first met Twain at a luncheon in New York when she was 14 years old and the two forged an instant connection, bonding over their shared political views and mutual admiration for each other. Keller later wrote about how Twain “treated me not as a freak, but as a handicapped woman seeking a way to circumvent extraordinary difficulties.” She recognized the author by his scent, as he often reeked of to***co. It was Twain who convinced industrialist Henry Huttleston Rogers to help pay for Keller’s education, and he was also the first person to refer to Anne Sullivan, Keller's teacher and companion, as a "miracle worker." Twain even gave Keller a blurb for her 1903 autobiography, which she wrote at age 22.
