Joseph Palmer

Joseph Michael Palmer (1789 – October 30, 1873) was an American bearded man, who faced persecution for wearing a beard. A prominent Transcendentalist and abolitionist, Palmer was a member of the Fruitlands commune and an associate of Louisa May Alcott.

Life A farmer from Notown, a village on the outskirts of Leominster, Massachusetts, Palmer was a veteran of the War of 1812.

Imprisonment reinforced Palmer's interest in political and religious reform. He was involved in prison reform and was an early abolitionist. In the early-1840s he attended the Chardon Street Convention in Boston, where he met prominent figures including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Amos Bronson Alcott, and William Lloyd Garrison. His acquaintance with Alcott led to his decision to join the Fruitlands experiment in 1843. Palmer joined the short-lived Fruitlands commune in Harvard, Massachusetts, where he proved one of the more practical farmers. He bought the group's property when it dissolved as a social experiment. Emerson and Henry David Thoreau visited him there.

Palmer supported the abolition of slavery.