Donald Grant Mitchell was born to Alfred and Lucretia Mitchell in Norwich on April 12, 1822. As a young boy, he exhibited a great fondness for the natural world. He spent his summers residing at his mother’s ancestral home known as Elmgrove in Salem, tramping through the surrounding woods and pastures. It was during these early years of his life that he began to form his lifelong devotion to agriculture.
Beginning in 1830, he attended a boarding school in Ellington, CT. Seven years later he entered Yale University at the age of fifteen. During his teenage years he continued to spend his summers at his mother’s family farm in Salem and with the aid of his brother Stephen, relished the daily agricultural chores of country living. Having already lost his father in 1831, the death of his mother and brother in quick succession in 1838 during his second year at Yale, delivered a great psychological blow to Donald Mitchell. After graduating as a valedictorian from Yale in 1841, he took up full time residence at the family farm in Salem. He had developed his talent for writing with his many contributions to the Yale Literary Review. He threw himself into his work, dividing his time between farming and writing essays on the virtues of the pastoral life.
General William Williams of Norwich had acted as a court appointed legal guardian and confidant to Mitchell after his mother died. He arranged for Mitchell to secure a position in the American consulate in Liverpool, England in 1844. Mitchell’s time spent abroad and traveling through the English countryside served to deepen his passion for country living. It was during this time that he began to develop his philosophy of a lifestyle that melded the virtues of rustic country life with the benefits of living in close proximity to an urban center.
After several years in Europe he returned to the family farm in Salem where he continued his writing career and adopting the pen name of Ik Marvel. After publishing a couple of books based on his European travels, his book Reveries of a Bachelor sold over 14,000 copies in 1850 catapulting Mitchell into the national spotlight. His next book Dream Life published 1851 was also very popular with the general public and cemented his status as a literary celebrity.
The financial rewards of his extremely popular books allowed Mitchell to purchase a farm on the outskirts of New Haven. The farm he christened Edgewood was gradually expanded to over 360 acres and embodied Mitchell’s philosophy of blending the best of rural and urban life. It was during this period of his life he used his skills as a cartographer and his vision of landscape design to help create a system of urban parks in New Haven.
To view images of the author and landscape designer Donald Grant Mitchell visit the Otis Library’s Flickr site of historical photographs.