Shared from the Substack Once Upon a Moment on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the United States Declaration of Independence, this essay explores the complicated history of freedom in America, and Lidian and Waldo Emerson’s involvement in Concord’s antislavery movement.

A press release from the Ralph Waldo Emerson Memorial Association (RWEMA) announcing expanded leadership and the 2026 opening date for the Emerson House.

Highlights from the special exhibition on Emerson’s daughters, Ellen Tucker Emerson and Edith Emerson Forbes, held at the Emerson House in Concord during our 2025 season.

Photos from an Emerson family album from the 1890s capture scenes from a Concord, MA winter over a century ago. Part of the greater Emerson House collection, this album is usually tucked away in a drawer and is being shared here for the first time.

A wintertime reflection on the origin of the seashells adorning several mantelpieces in the Emerson House in Concord, MA, and their connection to Ralph Waldo Emerson’s untimely loss of his younger brothers Edward and Charles.

Highlights from the 2025 visitors’ season at the Emerson House and a thank you to all who made it such a success.

A biographical profile of Ralph Waldo & Lidian’s third child, Edith Emerson, who married William Hathaway Forbes in 1865. Sociable and well-organized, Edith continued to play a vital role in her parents’ and siblings’ lives after marriage, including overseeing the repairs of the family home after the 1872 fire and working with her father on assembling the poetry anthology Parnassus.

Celebrating the occasion of Lidian Jackson Emerson’s 223rd birthday and her inclusion in Randall Fuller’s recent group biography, Bright Circle: Five Remarkable Women in the Age of Transcendentalism.

Ellen Tucker Emerson and Edith Emerson Forbes’ lives are often treated as a footnote to their famous father, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Kate Culkin’s recent dual biography, Emerson’s Daughters: Ellen Tucker Emerson, Edith Emerson Forbes, and Their Family Legacy (University of Massachusetts Press, 2025) brings these women’s stories to the fore, inviting interest in Ellen and Edith for their own sakes. Join Culkin at the Emerson House on Sunday, September 28, 2025 for an author’s tour of the special exhibition celebrating the sisters’ lives.

Kate Culkin’s new book, Emerson’s Daughters: Ellen Tucker Emerson, Edith Emerson Forbes, and Their Family Legacy (University of Massachusetts Press, July 2025), is a dual biography of the sisters who worked behind the scenes to shape the image of their famous father. In honor of the book’s release this month, the Emerson House will be showcasing items from our Ellen and Edith collections, some of which will be on display to the public for the first time.

To read more about the people and places of Concord, Massachusetts, we invite you to explore the current and back issues of Discover Concord, a visitor-focused magazine available in print and online. The Emersons and their friends are frequent subjects of articles, some of which are penned by our own Emerson House guides.

This year, the spring reopening of the Emerson House coincides with the 55th anniversary of Earth Day. In promoting environmental protection and celebrating the web of life, Earth Day reflects Ralph Waldo Emerson’s own reverence for nature—a common theme in his writings. Today, and beyond, we find inspiration in Emerson’s poems—his words exalting the wisdom of a bee; the beauty of a wildflower; the sentience of a tree.