Located 20 mi/30 km northwest of Boston, the village of Concord, Massachusetts, was one of the first places where musket balls flew during the Revolutionary War. The main battle site, Old North Bridge, is part of Minuteman National Historic Park, as are Hartwell Tavern (which changed hands several times during that day) and other related sites along Route 2A and in nearby Lexington.
Concord's other claim to fame is the large number of authors who lived and wrote there. You can visit the residences of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Emerson House) and Louisa May Alcott (Orchard House) and another house (Wayside) that Alcott and Nathaniel Hawthorne both lived in at different times.
Concord Museum highlights the town's literary connections, displaying the furnishings and books of Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.
Thoreau's Walden Pond is nearby. It's an especially nice getaway during the fall foliage season (in summer the pond and its shores get crowded). Rock musician Don Henley and other celebrities waged a successful battle to save Walden Pond from something not on Thoreau's list of life's essentials: condo conversion. As a result of their Walden Woods Project, the land around the pond will remain open to the public for walking, hiking and, of course, contemplating.
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