Ralph Waldo Emerson, born in Boston on May 25, 1803, lived most of his life in nearby Concord, a town founded by his Puritan ancestor Peter Bulkeley, who had fled English persecution in 1635. Emerson's lineage was steeped in religious culture. His great-grandfather, step-grandfather, and grandfather all were Concord pastors; his grandfather William, who died in 1776, was known as the “patriot minister of the Revolution”. Emerson's father William (1769-1811) became the prominent Federalist pastor of Boston's First Church and helped establish two of that city's important early cultural institutions, the Boston Athenaeum and
The Monthly Anthology, forerunner of the influential
North American Review. His mother, Ruth Haskins Emerson (1768-1853), was the daughter of a prosperous Boston…
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Citation: Thomas, Joseph. "Ralph Waldo Emerson". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 21 March 2003 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4905, accessed 21 November 2024.]
