Early years and education Henry Mills Alden was born on November 11, 1836, in
Mount Tabor, Vermont to Ira Alden and Elizabeth Moore Alden. His earliest American ancestor was
John Alden, and his mother was a niece of the academic
Zephaniah Swift Moore, who served as president of
Amherst College and
Williams College. When he was eight years old, his family moved to
Hoosick Falls, New York. He attended public schools in
Rensselaer County with intervals working at a cotton factory before he enlisted at Ball Seminary in Hoosick Falls. Alden enrolled at
Williams College at the age of sixteen. At Williams, he chose to study
psychology and
classics over advanced
mathematics, which deprived him of academic honors. He graduated with the class of 1857 and entered
Andover Theological Seminary, which he chose for its large library of
Greek literature. While studying at Andover, Alden became an acquaintance and frequent guest of the abolitionist and author
Harriet Beecher Stowe. Stowe read some of his earliest published work and forwarded two of his essays on the
Eleusinian Mysteries in Greek theology, entitled "The Eleusinia" and "The Saviors of Greece," to
James Russell Lowell, who published them in
The Atlantic Monthly in 1859 and 1860. ==Works==