Mark Twain's choice of Huckleberry Finn as the name (or nickname) of his best-loved character has been virtually unexamined, yet its uniqueness and effectiveness make that choice worthy of further thought. A suggestive precedent was his use of Mulberry Sellers, but Twain knew the huckleberry only by hearsay until he encountered it in Hartford in 1868. An American word, “huckleberry” originated about 1670 and appeared in some common expressions with connotations of insignificance and rusticity, both qualities appropriate for Huck. The real-life model for Huck was Twain's boyhood friend, Tom Blankenship, like Huck the son of the Town Drunkard. “Finn” came from another Hannibal alcoholic, and was suitable both phonetically and because it was Irish. The appropriateness of huckleberry is underlined by a quality of the berry itself. As Thoreau and others tell us, it does not submit to cultivation and tastes best when picked wild. Twain's Huckleberry, too, resisted domestication.