Even while Emerson was still alive, Concordians began to think of ways to pay public tribute to him.  The establishment of the Concord Free Public Library in 1873 provided a natural opportunity to honor him.  Emerson had been involved in the succession of libraries in town from the Concord Social Library on.  He served on the Library Committee of the Concord Free Public Library from 1873 until his death in 1882.  For that reason, there was a particular appropriateness in the library’s early transformation into something of an Emerson shrine.

   After Emerson died, two people who had been close to him held responsible positions within the library’s administrative structure.  His friend Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar was president of the Library Corporation from 1873 until 1894, his son Edward Waldo Emerson a member of the Library Committee from 1884 until 1922, chairing the committee from 1909 until 1921.  Their commitment to keeping Emerson’s memory alive in Concord was key to the development of this institution as a memorial to him.

   In 1873, Judge Hoar, his sister Elizabeth, and Reuben N. Rice (a Social Circle comrade of Hoar and Emerson and a member of the Library Committee) purchased and presented the 1848 Emerson portrait painted in Edinburgh by David Scott.  This painting—on public display since its presentation—was the first of a number of important acquisitions that have made the library a center for Emerson iconography and Emerson research.

   One hundred and thirty-five contributors joined forces in 1884 to place a marble version of Daniel Chester French’s 1879 bust of Emerson in the library.  In 1895, William James Stillman’s 1858 oil painting Philosophers’ Camp in the Adirondacks (which includes the figure of Emerson) was added through the bequest of E.R. Hoar.  In 1914, an impressive marble statue by French of Emerson seated—commissioned by a Concord committee appointed to erect a public memorial to the man—was unveiled in the library.  In 1918, William Taylor Newton’s rich collection of printed Emerson materials was presented by Emerson’s surviving children, Edward Waldo Emerson and Edith Emerson Forbes.

   The Emerson holdings of the Concord Free Public Library continue to grow, through both gift and purchase.  Today, the library’s Special Collections include a range of materials—manuscripts, printed volumes, photographs, ephemera, and works of art among them—documenting the life and work of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

   When Emerson died, the Concord Free Public Library was the only local collecting and interpretive agency yet founded.  Since then, other institutions devoted in some degree to Emerson interpretation have been established in Concord.  The Concord Antiquarian Society—predecessor of the Concord Museum, which now houses Emerson’s study—was established in 1886.  The Emerson House has been run by the Ralph Waldo Emerson Memorial Association since 1930.  The Old Manse was deeded to the Trustees of Reservations in 1939.  In addition, the Orchard House, the Minute Man National Historical Park (including the Wayside), the Walden Pond State Reservation, and the Thoreau Institute in Lincoln all play a part in promoting understanding of Emerson as a man and as a thinker.

   Thousands of pilgrims annually visit these institutions and a variety of other Concord sites—the Town House and Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, for example—to make a personal connection with Emerson and to understand what this town meant to him.
 
 

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