On this date in Maine history: Sept. 1

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 1, 2020

Sept. 1, 1846: Transcendentalist author Henry David Thoreau, later the writer of the 1854 book “Walden; or, Life in the Woods,” departs northward from Bangor on the first of his three wilderness expeditions into Maine’s North Woods. The second occurs in 1853 and the third in 1857. During those visits, Thoreau explores Moosehead Lake and climbs most of Mount Katahdin in an age when no clearly marked mountain trails exist and the nearest settlement is dozens of miles away.