Overview

Henry David Thoreau, one of America’s most prominent environmental writers, supported himself as a land surveyor for much of his life, parcelling land that would be sold off to loggers. In the only study of its kind, Patrick Chura analyses this seeming contradiction to show how the best surveyor in Concord combined civil engineering with civil disobedience. Placing Thoreau's surveying in historical context, Thoreau the Land Surveyor explains the cultural and ideological implications of surveying work in the mid-nineteenth century. Chura explains the ways that Thoreau's environmentalist disposition and philosophical convictions asserted themselves even as he reduced the land to measurable terms and acted as an agent for bringing it under proprietary control. He also describes in detail Thoreau's 1846 survey of Walden Pond. By identifying the origins of Walden in--of all places--surveying data, Chura re-creates a previously lost supporting manuscript of this American classic.

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9780813041476

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A unique book that treats Henry David Thoreau, often called America's first environmentalist, as a man strongly influenced in his philosophy by his land surveying practice in Concord, Massachusetts. . . . Required reading for every practicing surveyor. --American Surveyor

Author Information

Patrick Chura is associate professor of English at the University of Akron and author of Vital Contact: Downclassing Journeys in American Literature from Herman Melville to Richard Wright.

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