Beginning in the mid-1840’s Henry David Thoreau began to study land surveying and was soon proficient enough to earn a living throughout the 1850’s as a civil engineer; he did surveying of woodlots, farms, roads and commercial properties for private owners, the town of Concord, surrounding towns, and even as far away as Perth Amboy, New Jersey at the Eagleswood utopian community.

Thoreau was so accurate in his work that he soon gained a reputation for being one of the best land surveyors in the region, and he earned more money as a surveyor than he did from writing or lecturing. The land where the house at 110 Walden Street now sits (now known as the Timothy Wheeler House) was surveyed by Thoreau in 1851, indicated by a granite post to the left of the driveway.

In 1866, four years after Thoreau’s death, his sister Sophia sold her brother’s surveying compass and tripod, through Concord auctioneer Sam Staples, to Sampson Douglass Mason. Mason then gave them to the Concord Free Public Library.  Thoreau left his surveying field notes and survey drafts in the care of Sophia, and she bequeathed them to the library sometime before her death in 1875. Almost 200 of Thoreau’s surveys are in the Concord Free Public Library Special Collections. The field notes and survey for 110 Walden Street is among those drafts.

This site is included on the itinerary Following in Thoreau’s Footsteps: Exploring the Freedom’s Way National Heritage Area created by The Thoreau Society with support from the Freedom’s Way National Heritage Area Partnership Grants Program.