Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau turned Walden, the 1846 tax protest, and Civil Disobedience into enduring arguments about conscience, reform, and state power in Antebellum America.
Born July 12, 1817 / Died May 6, 1862
On July 12, 1817, in Concord, Massachusetts, Henry David Thoreau was born into a family whose pencil business supported his education and intellectual life. He graduated from Harvard College in 1837, taught briefly, and entered the reform-minded circle around Ralph Waldo Emerson. Concord's lyceums, antislavery meetings, and literary culture gave his early career both audience and direction.
Thoreau lived at Walden Pond from 1845 to 1847, turning that experiment into Walden in 1854, one of the most influential books of Antebellum letters. His refusal to pay the poll tax in 1846 led to the lecture and essay later published as "Resistance to Civil Government" in 1849, now commonly called Civil Disobedience. He also spoke forcefully against the Fugitive Slave Act and defended John Brown after Harpers Ferry in 1859.
Thoreau's writing later influenced labor reformers, conservationists, and advocates of nonviolent resistance far beyond New England. Civil Disobedience became especially important to twentieth-century movements for civil rights and anti-colonial protest, giving lasting reach to arguments first forged in the politics of the Mexican War and slavery.
Key Contributions
- It is based in Concord, Massachusetts, United States, at the house where Henry David Thoreau was born in 1817.
- With members from all 50 states and countries around the world, the Society disseminates knowledge about Thoreau by collecting books, manuscripts, and artifacts relating to Thoreau and his contemporaries, by encouraging the use of its extensive collections, and by publishing two periodicals, the Thoreau Society Bulletin and the Concord Saunterer.
- Henry David Thoreau died on May 6, 1862.
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