Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) was the son of a shopkeeper and entrepreneur who set up a pencil making business in Thoreaus youth. Both of his elder brothers were schoolteachers, who both helped to finance their younger brother through the considerable expenses of attending Harvard (about $179 a year in 1837). After graduating in 1837 he initially set up a school with his brother, but after it had to close in 1841 he turned himself to the task of the aspiring writer; before quickly learning that the income from this wasn't sufficient, and so supplemented it throughout his life both from the family business and also through work as a surveyor. His most famous book was 'Walden', a memoir of time spent near Walden Pond in a cabin that he owned. Thoreau died of tuberculosis in 1862, at the age of 44.
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