Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) was an essayist, poet, philosopher, and naturalist whose work influenced generations of thinkers including Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Tolstoy. He famously lived for two years at Walden Pond in a cabin on Ralph Waldo Emerson's land, an experience that became his masterwork Walden (1854). His essay Civil Disobedience, inspired by a night spent in jail for refusing to pay a poll tax, became a foundational text for nonviolent resistance movements worldwide. Born, lived, and died in Concord, Massachusetts.