Various relatives helped the elder Curtis raise his two sons until 1830 when they were sent to boarding school in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, near Boston. When their father remarried in 1835, the boys moved back to Providence to complete their education. In 1838 young George William attempted to enroll at Brown University but failed his entrance examinations. Not discouraged, he continued reading widely and attended lectures in Providence by such visiting notables as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Richard Henry Dana, and Margaret Fuller. In 1839 the elder George Curtis moved his family to New York City, where he eventually became president of Continental Bank. George William, then fifteen, began working for an import house. After his initial excitement about his job, he tired of the business world and returned to study under private tutors.
In the spring of 1842, the eighteen- and twenty-year-old Curtis brothers left New York City for what became an eighteen-month stay at the Brook Farm commune. Their father was reluctant to give his approval but was finally won over by the educational opportunities available at the settlement. The Brook Farm experience was a seminal one in the life of George Curtis.
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