| 1817/07/12 |
Henry David Thoreau is born David Henry Thoreau in Concord, Massachusetts, the son of John Thoreau, a pencil maker, and Cynthia Dunbar. |
Born |
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Wheeler-Minot Farmhouse |
Concord, MA |
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| 1817/10/12 |
David Henry, son of Cynthia wife of Joh, is baptized by Rev Ezra Ripley. First Parish in Concord (lost). |
Faith |
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First Parish in Concord |
Concord, MA |
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| 1835/00/00 |
Henry David Thoreau contracts tuberculosis. |
Illness |
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| 1837/10/00 |
Thoreau teaches children at the schoolhouse on the northwest end of the common. He will leave his teaching post because of the school's policy on corporal punishment. |
Work |
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Concord Monument Square-Lexington Road Historic District |
Concord, MA |
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| 1838/00/00 |
Thoreau gives speeches at the Concord Lyceum in a free lecture series sponsored by the town. Using such venues as the Masonic Hall and the Town House, Thoreau will give a total of 19 talks at the Concord Lyceum between 1838 to 1860. |
Work |
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Concord Monument Square-Lexington Road Historic District |
Concord, MA |
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| 1841/01/06 |
Henry David Thoreau signs-off from membership at First Parish Concord (lost). |
Faith |
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First Parish in Concord |
Concord, MA |
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| 1841/04/00 |
Ralph W Emerson invites Henry D Thoreau to "live with me and work with me in the garden and teach me to graft apples." |
Home |
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Ralph Waldo Emerson House |
Concord, MA |
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| 1844/00/00 |
Henry David Thoreau visits Mount Monadnock four times between 1844 and 1860 and spends a great deal of time observing and cataloging natural phenomena. |
Visitor |
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Mount Monadnock |
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| 1844/07/00 |
Thoreau spends a night on the summit of Mount Greylock. His depiction of this trip in "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers" (1849) describes his climb up what is today the Bellows Pipe Trail. |
Life |
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Mount Greylock Summit Historic District |
Adams, MA |
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| 1845/03/25 |
Henry Thoreau lectures on "Concord River" at the Unitarian Church (lost) in Concord, Massachusetts for the Concord Lyceum. |
Speaker |
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First Parish in Concord |
Concord, MA |
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| 1845/03/30 |
Near the end of March, I borrowed an axe and went down to the woods by Walden Pond, nearest to where I intended to build my house, and began to cut down some tall arrowy white pines, still in their youth, for timber. - HDT |
Architect |
Walden: Life in the Woods |
Walden Pond |
Concord, MA |
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| 1845/07/04 |
Henry Thoreau goes to live at Walden Pond. "My house makes me think of some mountain houses I have seen, which seemed to have a fresher auroral atmosphere about them, as I fancy of the halls of Olympus." |
Home |
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Walden Pond |
Concord, MA |
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| 1845/08/05 |
HDT sends Benjamin Watson fruit: One box is full of red huckleberries warranted not to change their hue, or lose their virtues in any climate.... The other contains half a dozen cherries (Sand Cherries, Bigelow?) The last grew within a rod of my lodge,... |
Home |
Walden: Life in the Woods |
Walden Pond |
Concord, MA |
Red Huckleberry |
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| 1845/10/10 |
Ralph Waldo Emerson pays Thoreau $5 for building a fence in Concord, Mass. |
Work |
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| 1845/11/00 |
I built the chimney after my hoeing in the fall, before a fire became necessary for warmth, doing my cooking in the meanwhile out of doors on the ground, early in the morning.... HDT |
Architect |
Walden: Life in the Woods |
Walden Pond |
Concord, MA |
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| 1846/07/23 |
Thoreau spends a night in the jail on the west side of the common, arrested for non-payment of taxes. Released after a relative paid the tax, he wrote "Civil Disobedience External" (originally published as "Resistance to Civil Government"). |
Life |
Walden: Life in the Woods |
Concord Monument Square-Lexington Road Historic District |
Concord, MA |
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| 1849/00/00 |
Henry Thoreau visits Cape Cod, the first of four trips |
Visitor |
Cape Cod (Thoreau book) |
John Newcomb House |
Wellfleet |
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| 1850/00/00 |
Thoreau home 1850-1862 |
Home |
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Thoreau-Alcott House |
Concord, MA |
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| 1851/00/00 |
Henry D Thoreau surveys a woodlot to be used for ministerial purposes for the First Parish, the original 1851 manuscript survey for it is in the First Parish records. |
Work |
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First Parish in Concord |
Concord, MA |
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| 1852/07/06 |
Edmund Hosmer is "the most intelligent farmer in Concord, and perchance in Middlesex." Thoreau journal entry |
Friend |
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Hunt-Hosmer House, Concord |
Concord, MA |
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| 1853/00/00 |
Henry David Thoreau visits Chesuncook Lake with Penobscot guide Joe Attean. |
Visitor |
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Chesuncook, ME |
Maine |
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| 1853/06/22 |
Henry David Thoreau writes in his Journal "Left our horse at How's Tavern. The oldest date on the sign is 'D.H. 1716.'" |
Guest |
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Longfellow's Wayside Inn |
Sudbury, MA |
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| 1854/00/00 |
Walden - published |
Author |
Walden: Life in the Woods |
Old Corner Bookstore |
Boston |
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| 1857/07/00 |
Henry Thoreau and two guides, Joseph Aitteon and Joe Polis from the East Branch of the Penobscot tribe, camp on Pillsbury Island in Eagle Lake in northern Maine. |
Life |
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Allagash Wilderness Waterway |
Maine |
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| 1862/05/06 |
Henry David Thoreau dies of Tuberculosis, he is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery |
Died |
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Thoreau-Alcott House |
Concord, MA |
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| 1862/05/06 |
Henry David Thoreau dies of Tuberculosis, he is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery |
Died |
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Sleepy Hollow Cemetery |
Concord, MA |
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| 1865/00/00 |
Cape Cod - published |
Author |
Cape Cod (Thoreau book) |
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