The Belgrade Historical Society

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E.B. White

E.B. White: A Life Rooted in Words and Wilderness

Elwyn Brooks White—better known as E.B. White—was a beloved American author whose works have shaped generations of readers. Born in Mount Vernon, New York, in 1899, White was a gifted essayist, poet and children’s book author. After graduating from Cornell University in 1921, where he acquired the lifelong nickname “Andy,” he pursued a career in writing that led him to The New Yorker magazine as one of its earliest contributors. Over the decades, White’s essays on everyday life, nature and the human condition established him as one of America’s most revered literary voices.
White’s enduring legacy is perhaps most deeply felt through his children’s books, including Charlotte’s Web, Stuart Little and The Trumpet of the Swan. These stories, rich in empathy and rooted in the rhythms of rural life, have touched millions of hearts and continue to inspire readers of all ages.

While White eventually made his permanent home in Brooklin, Maine, on the coast, he held a deep and formative connection to Belgrade, Maine, where his family spent many summers during his youth. Nestled among the lakes and rolling woods of central Maine, Belgrade became a sanctuary for the young White—a place of natural wonder, adventure and introspection. The rhythms of lake life, the quiet mornings, the wildlife and the simplicity of country living all made a profound impression on him.

This connection found one of its most poignant expressions in White’s celebrated 1941 essay, Once More to the Lake. In it, he recounts returning to a lake (Great Pond) in Maine with his young son, retracing the footsteps of his own childhood. The essay explores the nature of memory, the passage of time, and the powerful sensations of nostalgia and continuity. As White watches his son experience the same joys he once did—fishing, boating, swimming—he confronts the deeply human realization that time passes, yet somehow remains suspended in these cherished places.

Once More to the Lake remains one of the most anthologized essays in American literature, not only for its lyrical prose but also for the quiet emotional truth it conveys—something deeply rooted in White’s experience of Belgrade.

E.B. White’s connection to Maine, and to Belgrade in particular, was not merely geographic—it was spiritual. Maine offered White the clarity, humility, and quiet that so deeply informed his voice. In both his essays and his fiction, the essence of places like Belgrade lingers: unhurried, enduring and quietly beautiful.