Murphy Hash. Dinner in Honor of Mr. Patrick Francis Murphy by Mr. George Thomson Wilson, on Wednesday the Third of January, One Thousand Nine Hundred and Six at Delmonico’s

New York: Tiffany Studios, 1906. Quarto-sized, ribbon-tied menu, (25 x 21 cm.), [8], [8] pages. Illustrated. A lavish menu for a testimonial banquet for Patrick Francis Murphy (1855-1931). The elaborate title page created by Tiffany Studios of New York, consists of an oval photo-portrait of Murphy pasted onto the stiff paper. Surrounding Murphy's black & white photo is a fanciful hand-colored jamboree of jesters, balloons, golf clubs, a wise old owl, &c., all accomplished in original watercolor, pen and ink, and pencil. The title text is added in calligraphy, as is the name of the specific recipient of this copy of the menu, "Mr. Ogden". Born in Boston, the son of Irish immigrants who arrived there in 1832, Murphy was a successful businessman as head of the Mark Cross Company, Boston purveyors of luxury leather goods, which later expanded to New York City. Murphy also served in the Massachusetts State Legislature (circa 1887-1889). He was perhaps best remembered as a great wit and a fabled after-dinner-speaker thriving in New York society during the Gilded Age. Mark Twain, himself coiner of the term "Gilded Age", was invited to this dinner, and it was Twain who competed with Patrick Francis Murphy for honors "in a battle of wits at a dinner in Paris" (NY Times obit), of which, by some accounts, Murphy was the winner. Examples of Murphy's wit peppered the Mark Cross sales catalogues, including the phrase "Living well is the best revenge". Murphy's son, Gerald Murphy, together with his wife Sara, were the models for F. Scott Fitzgerald's Gatsby and Zelda, and the dedicatees of the great novel. As for New York's claim to Murphy, one Bostonian attending a dinner there wrote, "I would not be true to Boston ... if I didn't claim Patrick Francis Murphy to-night as Boston's own – and we have loaned him to you in New York here for a short while." The elegant meal itself consisted of eight courses beginning with a Tortue Verte, Amontillado. Following the formal menu are four leaves, printed rectos only via ditto, each filled with verse celebrating Murphy in good humor, to be sung to well-know "airs", the first being "Patrick Francis Murphy" to the tune of "Tammany." George Thomson Wilson, sponsor of the dinner, was a pioneer in American life insurance. It was he who invited Mark Twain to this dinner (Mark Twain Day by Day, vol. 4, online). All lightly bound in green paper paper, hand-lettered "Murphy Hash" and tied with original green ribbon. In fine condition.