The Legacy and Allure of Orchard House’s Landscape
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BY JAN TURNQUIST
“Little Women saved my life…twice.”
The woman who uttered these amazing words as I was leaving Orchard House late one summer evening had just landed at Logan Airport from Korea and drove directly here. She continued: “Growing up in Korea, I felt I was nothing. I was hopeless. I discovered Little Women and found a true soulmate in Jo March. I vowed to be something! Later, as a single mother of three daughters, I re-read Little Women and found renewed strength through the character of Marmee. Now, I have come to America as a visiting professor, and tomorrow, I will tour the house with one of my daughters, but first, I want to walk this land as the Alcotts did. I want to imagine the life they lived here. I am so thankful that Orchard House exists.” Deeply moved, l left her to fulfill her pilgrimage, realizing yet again that although the great outdoors surrounding Orchard 18
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House may no longer be “great” in acreage, it is greatly evocative for so many visitors. I, too, often find myself envisioning Louisa, her family, friends, and neighbors enjoying our orchards and gardens. In 1857, after scouting sites in Concord to settle his family after moving over 20 times, A. Bronson Alcott wrote: “I looked at the Moore place adjoining Hillside under the Elms and butternuts … I can have five or ten acres of woodland behind the house … The house is old, but still habitable, and with some repairs might do till our means enabled us to make it what we want. All this I can have for 950 dollars. . . . it seems the fittest spot for a house, protected by the hills on all sides round from East to West and enjoying the South so pleasantly. And the house and grounds combining many advantages of comfort and tillage and estates of content.”
| 2022 Guide to the Great Outdoors
Although John Moore’s noted orchards containing a half-dozen varieties of apples held the strongest attraction for Mr. Alcott — and led him to bestow the name “Orchard House” on his new home — the ability to produce upwards of 35 barrels of apples per year certainly made it a “thrifty acquisition” as well. What Mr. Alcott underrepresented was that the 200-year-old house was in dreadful condition. Considered by others as “fit for nothing but firewood” and thrown into the real estate deal for free, Mr. Alcott nevertheless set to work rescuing and modifying the structure to economically create a large and beautiful home. He worked tirelessly on the property for two decades, keeping meticulous notes and making sketches that have allowed scholars and horticulturalists to understand his vision for this “fittest spot.”
© Trey Powers
Orchard House in Summer
