Cynthia Dunbar, b. May 28, 1787, Keene, N.H.; moved to Concord Massachusetts with mother and stepfather in 1798; d. March 12, 1872; now bu. at Author's Ridge in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery.

Notes

• Cynthia was outspoken, opinionated and sociable. She was known as a good homemaker and hostess. In addition to taking in boarders for income, she often brought the less-fortunate into her home for meals. She was active in the Concord Ladies Anti-slavery Society and made her Concord home a stop on the Underground Railroad.
• As a boy Thoreau was often called upon to drive his mother's cows to and from their grazing pastures and developed an early love of solitude and communion with nature.
• Cynthia outlived all her children but the youngest, Sophia, dying in 1872 just two months short of her 85th birthday.

Links

• Family Tree of Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
• Women of Wednesday: Cynthia Dunbar Thoreau
• Henry David Thoreau: an outline biography