Ron's right--Tom Blankenship was a childhood friend of Twain's.  In 1906
he recalled TB as the model for Huck.  From _Mark Twain A to Z_ (1995):

[TB's] father, Woodson Blankenship, resembled Pap Finn in being a town
drunk [in Hannibal], but was quite different in having a wife, Mahala, and
eight children, all of whom were born in Missouri.  The Blankenships were
desperately poor, undisciplined and disreputable.  Tom Blankenship
consequently grew up badly fed, unschooled, unwashed and unsupervised.
(37)

Different stories describe Tom's adult life: in 1889 and 1899 he was
reported dead, but in 1902 Tom's sister Elizabeth told Twain he was a
"respected justice of the peace in Montana." (37)

Jon


----------------------
Jon Stephen Miller
Assistant Editor
Walt Whitman Quarterly Review
Department of English
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa  52242-1492
[log in to unmask]
1.319.335.0592