TripLearning

The REAL Huck Finn's House (Tom Blankenship) Hannibal , Missouri A small town north of St. Louis , MO is the boyhood home of Samuel Clemens, better known by his pen name, Mark Twain.  The Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum offers several buildings to tour with displays, interactive exhibits, the Norman Rockwell gallery and treasured Clemens family artifacts. Mark Twain's Boyhood Home The kids got to meet "Mark Twain" "Painting the fence" revealed artifacts in the museum Mark Twain based Tom Sawyer on his own childhood in Hannibal and some of his characters off of people in town.  Huckleberry Finn was based on his friend, Tom Blankenship.  Becky Thatcher was his childhood friend, Laura Hawkins.  Sam Clemens lived in Hannibal from age 4 to 17.  If you love the stories of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, a visit to Hannibal will make you feel like you have stepped into the books. We enjoyed walking through the...

To finish off our time in Memphis this morning, we made a stop by the Lorraine Motel.  This is the motel where Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot.  They have preserved the motel and built the National Civil Rights Museum around part of it.  The balcony where he was standing when he was shot is outside and you can walk up and see it.  Then the museum connects to the room, so you can go in the room and see what it looked like.  Normally the museum is closed on Tuesdays, so we thought we would just drive by and see the outside.  When we arrived we discovered they had temporarily opened it today to accommodate more travelers.  Unfortunately we did not have time to stay and tour the museum.  The website for the museum has a lot of resources to help with discussions as well as printable scavenger hunt sheets for various ages.  The wreath marks the place where MLK, Jr. was shot.  The cars represent the two cars they had that they were go...