{"nrhp_refnum":"66000365","name":"Emerson, Ralph Waldo, House","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"18 Cambridge Tpke. (Lexington Rd. and Cambridge Tpke.)","address_restricted":false,"city":"Concord","county":"Middlesex County","state":"MA","lat":42.45653469150005,"lon":-71.34263857120979,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1966-10-15","is_nhl":true,"nhl_designated_date":"1962-12-29","areas_of_significance":["Literature"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-story frame and clapboard house at 28 Cambridge Turnpike in Concord, Massachusetts, built in 1828-29 by John T. Coolidge for his son Charles. It sits on about 9 acres with a garden, barn and meadow.","why_significant":"It was the home of poet, essayist and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson from 1835 until his death in 1882. All of his major works, including Nature, \"The American Scholar\", Essays, Representative Men and English Traits, were prepared here. The house was restored after a 1872 fire and remains largely as it was after that work.","narrative":"This house at 28 Cambridge Turnpike in Concord, Massachusetts, was the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson from 1835 until his death in 1882. John T. Coolidge built it in 1828-29 for his son Charles, and Emerson bought it with about 2 acres, later expanding the grounds to 9 acres. In 1836 he added two rooms to the southwest corner, and in 1857 a bay window and an attic room called \"the den\" were added. Emerson wrote his major works here, including Nature, \"The American Scholar\", two series of Essays, Representative Men and English Traits. A fire in July 1872 destroyed the roof and much of the second floor, but friends funded a full restoration. After the last of Emerson's children died in 1930, the Ralph Waldo Emerson Memorial Association took over the property. The rooms remain as they were after the 1872-73 restoration, except the study, whose original contents went to the Concord Antiquarian Society and were replaced by duplicates around 1930.","period_of_significance":"1828-29; 1835-82","architect_builder":"Built by John T. Coolidge for his son Charles (1828-29); the form's builder/architect field reads \"not known\"","architectural_style":null,"criteria":[],"status_note":"Maintained in good condition and operated as a museum open to the public in season; the Ralph Waldo Emerson Memorial Association administers it.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 01:58:46.898678-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/53/7937/63793753/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/66000365_NHL.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/66000365/102363f525-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/66000365/102363f525-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Daderot.","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ralph_Waldo_Emerson_House_(Concord,_MA).JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Daderot.</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ralph_Waldo_Emerson_House_(Concord,_MA).JPG"},"district":{"nrhp_refnum":"77000172","name":"Concord Monument Square-Lexington Road Historic District","url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/districts/massachusetts/concord-monument-square-lexington-road-historic-district-77000172/"},"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63793753","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Waldo_Emerson_House","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7288218"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/middlesex-county/emerson-ralph-waldo-house-66000365/"}