In the summer of 1842, Concord was like any other New England town. Sitting 18 miles west of Boston, the town of 2,000 souls was still very rural. The railroad wouldn’t come through for another two years, and there was no telegraph yet; only the daily stagecoach and the post office connected Concord to the rest of the world.
Amos Bronson Alcott was about to drown.
How could this be happening? Born on November 29th, 1799, he was the eldest son of a poor farmer from Wolcott, Connecticut, and he was only 19 years old! Straining to keep his head above water, Bronson could see his bag on the shore with the $100 he was bringing home to help pay his father’s debts. And what of his mother, who taught Bronson his ABCs by having him trace them on her dirt parlor floor, her warm memory in stark contrast to the rigid teacher in the one room schoolhouse Bronson attended until leaving at age 10 to work full-time on his father’s farm.
