Join Ed Schofield, Ph.D. as he relates the many connections between the Concord and Worcester Transcendentalist.

Here's a preview of just some of what you'll see and learn on this tour of Worcester, MA:

The space in which the Maxham daguerreotype of Thoreau was made; H.G.O. Blake's will in the Worcester County Court House; Mechanics Hall, where Thoreau spoke on John Brown; the Worcester Centrum, venue of Don Henley's first-ever Concert for Walden Woods (April 1990); Higginson's home; the site of H.G.O. Blake's and Theophilus Brown's homes in Thoreau's day (both demolished in a fit of "urban renewal" in the 1950s or '60s); the house in which Blake died and in which all of Thoreau's manuscripts were being stored; the original site of the State Normal School at Worcester (now Worcester State College), of which E. Harlow Russell was principal (i.e., president); the site of old Brinley Hall and the original Worcester City Hall, in both of which Thoreau lectured; the site-cum-plaque of the railway depot used by Thoreau, Alcott, Emerson, John Brown, and other luminaries, including Abraham Lincoln in 1848; the nearby Worcester Bank Block building; original manuscript records of the Natural History Society describing some of the very specimens Thoreau examined and mentioned in the Journal.

Ed will try to get AAS/MWA to make its Thoreauviana available, including some exciting recent acquisitions.

Also, he'll show where the Thoreau manuscripts Blake and Russell owned were stored for safe-keeping, first while Blake was in Europe and later by Russell after he had inherited them.

And the site of the post office in which T. W. Higginson received the famous letter from Emily Dickinson.

And much, much more!!! During the tour, Ed will reveal three "hidden secrets" about Worcester history:

1). The identity of the until now unknown minister who wrote the letter to Thoreau asking his advice on what to take to the White Mountains

2). The details of Benjamim D. Maxham's pre- and post-Worcester life, as well as his life in Worcester during most of the 1850s. It's an amazing story!

3). The background behind the January 1855 Journal entry in which Thoreau records a visit to and a lecture in Worcester. Thoreau mentions a "Leo L. Lloyd," a young Black man who said that he lectured on "Young Africa." Ed has guy's life story--well, almost. He has a full decade's worth and knows the origins and eventual demise of Leo Lloyd.