Parkman was a well-known figure in the streets of Boston, which he walked daily, collecting his rents (a thrifty man, he did not own a horse). He was tall, lean, had a protruding chin, and wore a top hat. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. said that "he abstained while others indulged, he walked while others rode, he worked while others slept." Frances "Fanny" Elizabeth Appleton Longfellow (18171861), wife of the poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (18071882), called him "the lean doctor... the good-natured Don-Quixote." He was reported to have a net worth of $500,000 in 1846, which is equal to $12,592,230 in 2012 money.