The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg

The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg is a piece of short fiction by Mark Twain. It first appeared in Harper's Monthly in December 1899, and was subsequently published by Harper Brothers in the collection The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Sketches (1900).

Related Topics:
Fiction - Mark Twain - 1899 - 1900

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In the story, Hadleyburg is called "the most honest and upright town in all the region round about." However, it causes an unnamed offense to a stranger, who in revenge purposes to corrupt the town. Coming back incognito, he deposits a sack at the home of an old cashier of the town bank and then disappears. Attached is a note purportedly from a foreigner who wishes to repay a kindness to one of the citizens of Hadleyburg with the sack's contents, "gold coin weighing a hundred and sixty pounds four ounces." The note says that the Hadleyburg citizen made a remark to the foreigner that changed his life, and asks that an advertisement be published in the local newspaper directing the person who made the remark to submit it in a sealed envelope to the local pastor, Rev. Burgess; if what is written by the person tallies with the remark as written in a sealed envelope inside the sack, that person gets the gold. The remainder of the story shows the citizens of Hadleyburg vying to obtain the gold, through many undignified and often self-deceiving stratagems.

Related Topics:
Town - Revenge - Bank - Gold - Newspaper

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