Originally born Nathaniel Hathorne, the native of Salem, Massachusetts soon changed his last name to Hawthorne to disguise his ancestral ties to John Hathorne, one of the judges who presided over the infamous Salem Witch Trials. Seeking to avoid the political blunders of his predecessors, it was in literature where Nathaniel Hawthorne left his untarnished mark upon the American Conscience -- a mark that even today, has yet to gather a single spec of dust.

Publishing his first book in Fanshawe in 1828, it was his novel "The Scarlett Letter" -- written just over two decades later -- which propelled Hawthorne to the heights of lasting renown. Singled out for its exploration of sin, legalism, and guilt, "The Scarlett Letter" also bears a distinction shared only by few works as one of the first books to be mass-produced in America. Revered by critics and authors such as D.H. Lawrence as a "perfect work of the American Imagination", the piece also elevated Hawthorne as one of the leading figures of American Romanticism along with writers Herman Melville and Edgar Allen Poe. Here are five lines delivered by one of the first most widely read authors in the United States:

Though Nathaniel Hawthorne no longer remains to circulate stories anew, his books continue to populate the shelves of libraries and bookstores, and the hands of eager readers in masses as when they first made their way around America in the masses. Forever serving as a reminder that the true weight of happiness and fulfillment is not found in what was once pursued, but to be counted among who carry on in pursuit. But to remain alone as one pursuing.