At one with Thoreau
A century and a half ago, Maine’s northern woods were a bit wilder. The logging roads crisscrossing the region had yet to be cut, and the state’s highest mountain, 5,269-foot Katahdin, was relatively unknown, having been climbed by just a handful of intrepid souls since its first recorded ascent, in 1804. But the area is still far from tame. It’s also not altogether different from the place written about glowingly by Henry David Thoreau after three trips there, in 1846, 1853, and 1857. It’s that wildness — touched by Thoreau’s sensibilities — that photographer Scot Miller seeks to bring to the public with a new exhibition at the Harvard Museum of Natural History (HMNH), one of the Harvard Museums of Science and Culture (HMSC). The show, which opened this month and runs through September, pairs Miller’s images of Maine’s majestic wilderness with items from Harvard’s collections, including a specimen of a plant, painted trillium,...