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About Us | The Thoreau Society Shop at Walden Pond Current walk-in hours:
The Shop is open year-round and operates within seasonal park hours.
The Thoreau Society Shop at Walden Pond first opened
for business in May 1995. It was initially positioned in the Walden Pond State
Reservation office building as a collaborative effort between the Society and
the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Management.
Previously, Thoreau fans and Concord pilgrims could
visit the Thoreau Lyceum at 156 Belknap Street. The Lyceum had been a popular meeting
place for Thoreauvians since it opened in 1966. Over the years, its staff answered
questions, produced publications, and sold Thoreau-related merchandise.
In 2015-2016, the old blue building was torn down in
order to erect a brand-new Walden Pond Visitor Center. For a year, the Shop
operated out of a trailer on the property. In October 2016, we were able to
move into the new Shop space, right next to the park's exhibit and movie
viewing rooms. Walden Pond State Reservation itself is open year-round, generally
from dawn to dusk. The Shop is open year-round with daily hours that vary by
season.
Shop staff members are knowledgeable about Henry David
Thoreau, his contemporaries, the town of Concord, and the local flora and
fauna. Some of them have written books in their areas of expertise. They are happy to converse with visitors and
travelers on all sorts of subjects.
(See staff bios, below.) The Shop carries primarily products related
to Henry D. Thoreau, to Walden Pond, to Concord and its historical authors, to
nature and the environment, to writing and creativity, and to related subjects.
We have books, apparel, artwork, cards, jewelry, souvenirs, gifts, and even
drinks and snacks. Many of the books on our shelves have been signed by the
authors. Many of our gift items and photographs come from local artists and
residents.
If The Shop at Walden Pond doesn't carry the book you're looking for, you can visit our page on Bookshop.org. Here you will have access to millions of additional books on a variety of subjects. Your purchase through this portal will still benefit The Thoreau Society.
I
had more cheering visitors ... Children come a-berrying, railroad men taking a
Sunday morning walk in clean shirts, fishermen and hunters, poets and
philosophers; in short, all honest pilgrims, who came out to the woods for
freedom's sake, and really left the village behind …
Peter Alden (Shop Associate) was born in
and again lives in Concord, where he began birding with the ghost of Henry
David Thoreau. He has led groups to one hundred countries on seven continents
and the seven seas, on birding tours, safaris, cruises, and private jet
excursions. Peter is the senior author of sixteen bird, mammal and travel books,
with more than three million copies sold. Along with Harvard’s E. O. Wilson,
the Walden Woods Project, and hundreds of invited specialists, Peter organized
the world’s first serious BioBlitzes. These events have certified 3,600 species
of plants and animals within five miles of Walden Pond. Peter has
worked at the Shop at Walden Pond since 2018. His favorite books at the Shop
include National Audubon Society Field Guide to New England, by Peter Alden and Brian
Cassie; Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Woods, by Richard Primack; and Walden: A Fully Annotated Edition, by Henry David Thoreau, and
edited by Jeffrey S. Cramer. Margaret Garrett (Shop
Associate) is an international touring and recording artist who grew up in
Newton, Mass. Her first encounter with Thoreau was seeing a copy of Walden in her father’s study. Early on,
she felt a resonance to Thoreau and Emerson whenever she went swimming at
Walden Pond. Margaret returned to the neo-transcendentalist community after
moving back to the Boston area from Los Angeles in 2019. She is an amateur
filmmaker and a wellness coach-in-training. Margaret has worked at the Shop at
Walden Pond since early 2023. Her favorite books at the Shop include The Journal, 1837-1861, by Henry David
Thoreau, with preface by John R. Stilgoe; The Listening Path: The Creative Art of Attention, by Julia Cameron; and Your Spacious Self: Clear the Clutter and Discover Who You Are, by Stephanie Bennett Vogt. Richard Smith (Shop Associate) has lectured on and written about antebellum United States history and 19th-century American literature since 1995. He has worked in Concord as a public historian and Living History Interpreter for 25 years, and he has portrayed Henry David Thoreau at Walden Pond and around the country. Richard has written eight books for Applewood Books and is a regular contributor to Discover Concord Magazine. He has worked at the Shop at Walden Pond since 2010. Richard’s favorite books at the Shop include The Transcendentalists and Their World, by Robert Gross; John Brown: Abolitionist, by David S. Reynolds; Eden’s Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father, by John Matteson; and To Set This World Right: The Antislavery Movement in Thoreau's Concord, by Sandra Petrulionus.
Corinne Smith (Shop Manager) has been a fan of Henry David Thoreau ever since she read “Civil Disobedience” and Walden in high school in the early 1970s. She worked for more than 30 years as a librarian at various venues in Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Massachusetts. She is the author of Westward I Go Free: Tracing Thoreau’s Last Journey, and the middle-grade biography, Henry David Thoreau for Kids: His Life and Ideas, with 21 Activities. She is the host of the regular episodes of the YouTube series, “Studying Thoreau.” Corinne has worked at the Shop at Walden Pond since 2018. Corinne’s favorite books at the Shop include Thoreau the Land Surveyor, by Patrick Chura; The Boatman: Henry David Thoreau’s River Years, by Robert M. Thorson; and On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, by Stephen King.
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