During the 1960's and '70's, wild, long, untamed hair styles became a badge of nonconformity. A departure from neat, carefully styled, conventional trends marked the age of the "hippie". Eschewing curlers and hairspray for women and refusing to display short, slicked-back styles for men meant a looser, more natural 'do was the thing for self-expression and freedom.

Of course, most new styles are really replays of old ones, and this is not a unique idea. The Transcendentalists of Concord were practicing non-conformist hairstyles more than a century before the flower children. While these philosophers and writers did not always agree upon what made up Transcendentalism, there was a strong movement away from dogma and traditionalism. "Hear[ing] a different drummer" went for appearance as well. (See here for more on Transcendentailism.)

According to photo historian William Allen of Arkansas State University, 19th century portraiture conventions meant subjects were thoroughly primped and posed before their images were captured. "These images (below) of Emerson, Alcott, and Thoreau remind me more of the wildness of Delacroix' portrait of Chopin than of typical portraits of this time," says Allen. "They express an inner state of being more than an outer convention."

Above right: Henry David Thoreau. Below (clockwise from upper left): Bronson Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson as a young man, and again in later years.