A Pilgrimage to Concord

Booked to speak at the Concord Players centennial celebration, I made sure to arrive a few hours early so I could do a little sightseeing in this American mecca. My Concord ancestors include my 9th great grandfather John Bellows (1622-1683), and my 8th great grandfather Thomas Estabrook (1629-1713), brother of Rev Joseph Estabrook, pastor in Concord for 44 years, for whom the Estabrook Woods is named. Several relatives fought at Lexington and Concord in the American Revolution. I am also related (more distantly) to most of the Transcendentalists and other writers of Concord, whom I've read widely and influenced me immensely: Emerson, Thoreau, the Alcotts, and Hawthorne, et al. I found however that a couple of hours in Concord was not nearly enough to see everything I wanted to see. That would require at least a couple of full days. So I shall have to return one day. But I did get to stroll around the town, and to see Walden Pond. And for my account of the Concord Players event, go here.