Henry David Thoreau - Conservationist, Visionary, and Humanist
He spent his life in voluntary poverty, enthralled by the study of
nature. Two years, in the prime of his life, were spent living in a shack
in the woods near a pond. Who would choose a life like this? Henry David
Thoreau did, and he enjoyed it. Who was Henry David Thoreau, what did he
do, and what did others think of his work?
Henry David Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts on July 12,
1817 ("Thoreau" 96), on his grandmother's farm. Thoreau, who was of
French-Huguenot and Scottish-Quaker ancestry, was baptized as David Henry
Thoreau, but at the age of twenty he legally changed his name to Henry
David. Thoreau was raised with his older sister Helen, older brother John,
and younger sister Sophia (Derleth 1) in genteel poverty (The 1995 Grolier
Multimedia Encyclopedia 1). It quickly became evident that Thoreau was
interested in literature and writing. At a young age he began to show
interest writing, and he wrote his first essay, "The Seasons," at the
tender age of ten, while attending Concord Academy (Derleth 4).
In 1833, at the age of sixteen, Henry David was accepted to Harvard
University, but his parents could not afford the cost of tuition so his
sister, Helen, who had begun to teach, and his aunts offered to help. With
the assistance of his family and the beneficiary funds of Harvard he went
to Cambridge in August 1833 and entered Harvard on September first. "He
[Thoreau] stood close to the top of his class, but he went his own way too
much to reach the top" (5).
In December 1835, Thoreau decided to leave Harvard and attempt to
earn a living by teaching, but that only lasted about a month and a half
(8). He returned to college in the fall of 1836 and graduated on August 16,
1837 (12). Thoreau's years at Harvard University gave him one great gift,
an introduction to the world of books.
Upon his return from college, Thoreau's family found him to be less
likely to accept opinions as facts, more argumentative, and inordinately
prone to shock people with his own independent and unconventional opinions.
During this time he discovered his secret desire to be a poet (Derleth 14),
but most of all he wanted to live with freedom to think and act as he
wished.
Immediately after graduation from Harvard, Henry David applied for
a teaching position at the public school in Concord and was accepted.
However, he refused to flog children as punishment. He opted instead to
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