Places

The James Merrill House in Stonington, Connecticut is nationally significant for its close, forty-one-year association with James Ingram Merrill (1926-95), one of his generation's most acclaimed poets---considered peerless among his contemporaries who were writing in meter and rhyme.

The Baldwin Residence is significant for its association with American author and activist James Baldwin. He owned this house and used it as his primary American home from 1965-1987. Baldwin made important contributions to American literature and social history. As a gay Black author, civil rights activist, and social commentator, he shaped discussions about race and sexuality. He was active in literary, political, and social circles, influencing all of them.

The Lorraine Hansberry residence, listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2021, is nationally significant for its association with the pioneering Black lesbian playwright, writer, and activist Lorraine Hansberry (1930-1965). Hansberry resided in a third-floor apartment in the building from 1953 to 1960, the period in which she created her most important work, the Raisin in the Sun.

The Joaquin Miller Cabin was relocated from the neighborhood near Meridian Hill Park and reconstructed in Rock Creek Park. Joaquin Miller was a poet and writer from California who briefly lived in the cabin when he lived in Washington, DC in the 1880s.

Longfellow Park preserves the view from the Vassall-Craigie-Longfellow House across open space to the Charles River. In the center of the designed landscape is a memorial to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Built as an apothecary for druggist Thomas Crease in 1718, it became a literary center in the mid-1800s. Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louisa May Alcott, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and others brought their manuscripts here to be published by Ticknor and Fields Company.

Edgar Allan Poe lived here when he wrote "The Gold Bug" and "The Black Cat."

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) was a notable American poet. Although many scoffed at his work, which seemed aimed for the masses and most often read by schoolchildren, others, including Edgar Allan Poe, held him in high regard. His most famous works include Paul Revere's Ride, The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline.

Sculptor: William Couper

The Zane Grey Museum, or Zane Grey House, is the former home of American author Zane Grey and his wife, Dolly. Grey is considered to be one of the most influential authors of the Western genre of literature. Exhibits on Zane Grey and a gift shop/bookstore are available inside the museum. The museum is open to the public from Memorial Day weekend to the last weekend in September.

Emily Dickinson, noted American poet, was born and lived out the majority of her life in this 2 ½ story brick house. Always something of a “homebody,” Emily began college in the fall of 1847, but found the required separation from her family and home distasteful.