He attended various schools in the Utica area but left at the age of eighteen without completing high school, the end of his formal education.[4] His interest in fossils solidified as he became a commercial fossil collector.[4] On January 9, 1872, Walcott married Lura Ann Rust, daughter of the owner of a farm in New York where Walcott made one of his most important trilobite discoveries (Walcott-Rust quarry). She died on January 23, 1876. Walcott's interest in fossils led to his acquaintance with Louis Agassiz of Harvard, who encouraged him to work in the field of paleontology; later that year, he began work as the assistant to the state palaeontologist, James Hall.