2024. Thoreau Society’s first endowment campaign successfully completed, raising $250,000 to fund the Thoreau Prize. Books published include A Year of Birds by Geoff Wisner.
2023. Thoreau Society launches partnership with Freedom’s Way National Heritage Area, to enrich interpretation of Thoreau connections along a corridor spanning 46 communities. Books published include Three Roads Back by Robert D. Richardson.
2022. Symposium “Thoreau & the Nick of Time” held at the Snorrastofa Cultural and Medieval Centre in Reykholt, Iceland. World-famous primatologist and conservationist Jane Goodall receives Thoreau Prize at Annual Gathering. Thoreau Society sponsors National Endowment for the Humanities program, “Transcendentalism and Social Reform: Activism and Community Engagement in the Age of Thoreau.”
2021. Books published include The Transcendentalists and Their World by Robert A. Gross.
2020. Thoreau Society begins administering the Henry David Thoreau Prize for Literary Excellence in Nature Writing, established in 2010 by Dale Peterson.
2019. James E. Francis, Sr., Tribal Historian of the Penobscot Nation, is named an Honorary Advisor. Margaret Carroll-Bergman of Thoreau Farm and Michael Frederick of Thoreau Society launch writing program The Write Connection. Thoreau Society establishes annual Thoreau Country Conservation Alliance (TCCA) graduate student fellowship.
2018. Symposium “Uses and Abuses of Thoreau at 200” held at University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Robert Thorson publishes The Guide to Walden Pond.
2017. Bicentennial of Henry David Thoreau. Symposium “Thoreau from Across the Pond” held in Lyon, France. Books published include Henry David Thoreau: A Life by Laura Dassow Walls, The Boatman: Henry David Thoreau’s River Years by Robert Thorson, Thoreau and the Language of Trees by Richard Higgins, and Thoreau’s Animals by Geoff Wisner.
2016. The Shop at Walden Pond begins operations in new eco-friendly building. Marjorie Harding Memorial Fellowship established.
2014. Canoe trip in northern Maine retraces 1857 route of Thoreau and Penobscot guide Joe Polis. Richard B. Primack publishes Walden Warming.
2013. Final version of “Mapping Thoreau Country: Tracking Henry David Thoreau’s Travels in Massachusetts” is completed, funded by grants from UMass Lowell and Mass Humanities.
2012. Concord Land Conservation Trust purchases 7.2 acres of Gowing’s Swamp after Cherrie Corey prepares a botanical inventory and historical review of the swamp.
2011. Paul Schacht launches Digital Thoreau at the State University of New York, College at Geneseo. Walden Climate Change Collaborative is launched with UMass Lowell and Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation.
2010. Dale Peterson establishes Henry David Thoreau Prize for literary excellence in nature writing. Winners will include Gretel Ehrlich, E. O. Wilson, Gary Snyder, Peter Matthiessen, T. C. Boyle, Diane Ackerman, Linda Hogan, and Sy Montgomery.
2009. Offices of Thoreau Society office move to Thoreau’s restored birth house at Thoreau Farm. Elise Lemire publishes Black Walden: Slavery and Its Aftermath in Concord, Massachusetts.
2007. Thoreau Society wins awards of excellence from Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles and New York Society of Illustrators for bird’s-eye-view map of Concord created by artist/illustrator John Roman.
2006. Sandra Harbert Petrulionis publishes To Set This World Right: The Antislavery Movement in Thoreau’s Concord.
1998. Thoreau Institute library opens in Lincoln. Thoreau Society collections make up bulk of its holdings, including Thoreau letters, survey, and manuscript leaves of “Moonlight” and “Autumnal Tints.”
1995. The Shop at Walden Pond opens for business.
1993. Bradley P. Dean publishes Faith in a Seed: The Dispersion of Seeds and Other Late Natural History Writings. New series of The Concord Saunterer, an annual journal of Thoreau studies, is launched.
1986. Robert D. Richardson Jr. publishes Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind.
1980. Elizabeth Witherell becomes Editor-in-Chief for the Princeton University edition of The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau.
1973. A Textual Center for the creation of a standard edition of Thoreau is established at Princeton University under the direction of William L. Howarth.
1969. Thoreau Society donates $500 to National Farm Workers Association and César Chávez, who had cited Thoreau as an inspiration for the Delano Grape Strike.
1966. Walter Harding publishes The Days of Henry Thoreau. Harding begins project to create a standard edition of Thoreau’s writings.
1964. William Stuart Nelson, Vice President of Howard University, delivers keynote address on Thoreau’s connection to the objectives of the civil rights movement.
1960. Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts orders restoration of Walden Pond to its previous condition, ruling that the pond had been conveyed by its previous owners “to aid the Commonwealth in preserving the Walden of Emerson and Thoreau.”
1957. In response to construction and cutting of trees at Walden Pond, John E. Nickols and Thoreau Society organize Save Walden Committee.
1948. Ruth Wheeler arranges sale of Thoreau herbarium to Thoreau Society from Middlesex School, the beginning of the Thoreau Society’s collections.
1945. Roland Wells Robbins discovers the remains of Thoreau’s cabin at Walden Pond.
1941. Thoreau Society founded. Thoreau Society Bulletin begins publication.