An outlook of Walden Pond.
Photo: Erik Granlund / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0

Audio walking tour

Concord Audio Walking Tour

Concord: Where Revolution and Reverie Meet

Stops
21
Core walk
19 of 21 stops within 1.5 mi of the center
Farthest stop
2.0 mi from the center
Start
Monument Square
21 stops GPS-triggered audio No app download Free to start

Twenty-one stops carry Concord through the field at Old North Bridge where the American Revolution began. Monument Square opens the walk; the Concord Museum, Concord Free Public Library, Wright's Tavern (standing since 1747), and Concord's Colonial Inn gather Revolutionary and colonial ground. The literary chapter follows: Henry David Thoreau's Walden Pond, where he spent two years in a cabin; the Thoreau-Alcott House; Orchard House where the Alcotts settled; the Ralph Waldo Emerson House at 18 Cambridge Turnpike; and The Wayside and The Old Manse along Cambridge Turnpike. Sleepy Hollow Cemetery holds the Transcendentalists. Old North Bridge, where the shot heard round the world was fired on April 19, 1775, sits inside Minute Man National Historical Park alongside Daniel Chester French's 1874 bronze Minute Man. Egg Rock at the Assabet and Sudbury rivers' confluence, the Col. James Barrett Farm, Punkatasset Hill, and Fairyland Pond close the walk.

Highlights

  • An outlook of Walden Pond.
    Walden Pond

    Walden Pond, all 64.5 acres of it, lies in front of you, a kettle hole left by retreating glaciers 10,000-12,000 years ago. The water you see is the principal feature of the 335-acre Walden Pond State Reservation, protected and managed by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation.

  • The Thoreau family gravesite in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord, Massachusetts. Small gravestones are, from left, Father (John), Henry, Sophia, Mother (Cynthia); not visible are Henry's siblings Helen and John.
    Sleepy Hollow Cemetery

    Sleepy Hollow Cemetery spreads along Bedford Street, near the center of Concord. This rural cemetery was designed in 1855 by landscape architects Cleveland and Robert Morris Copeland and dedicated on September 29, 1855; Ralph Waldo Emerson gave the dedication speech and would be buried here decades later.

  • The One Minute Man Sculpture made in 1874 by Daniel Chester French. Stone Inscription: BY THE RUDE BRIDGE THAT ARCHED THE FLOOD, THEIR FLAG TO APRIL'S BREEZE UNFURLED, HERE ONCE THE EMBATTLED FARMERS STOOD, AND FIRED THE SHOT HEARD ROUND THE WORLD.
    Minute man

    Daniel Chester French's Minute Man, an 1874 bronze, rises in front of you in Minute Man National Historical Park in Concord. The bronze figure you see was created between 1871 and 1874 after extensive research; it was originally intended to be made of stone, but the medium was switched to bronze and the statue was cast from ten Civil War-era cannons appropriated by Congress.

  • A Revolution begins - A Nation is born. At Minute Man National Historical Park the opening battle of the Revolution is brought to life as visitors explore the battlefields and witness the American revolutionary spirit through the writings of the Concord authors.
    Old North Bridge

    Spanning the Concord River in Concord, Massachusetts, this wooden crossing is the North Bridge, often called the Old North Bridge. On April 19, 1775, provincial minutemen and militia companies numbering approximately 400 engaged roughly 90 British Army troops at this spot.

  • The Old Manse (former home of Rev. William Emerson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Nathaniel Hawthorne) in Concord, Massachusetts.
    The Old Manse

    Built in 1770 for the Rev. William Emerson, the Old Manse faces you on Monument Street in Concord, Massachusetts. The house is notable for its literary associations and is open to the public as a nonprofit museum owned and operated by the Trustees of Reservations.

All 21 stops

How it works

1

Open on your phone

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2

Start walking

Head toward any historic stop. No fixed route.

3

Audio plays itself

Walk within range of a stop and the story begins.

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