An essay and a series of location shots, courtesy of the author!
What do you think? Is it as you imagined while reading the book? Is it much like your own town or where you grew up?
Thanks to Stewart for entrusting us with his album!
About these photos:
I've been meaning to set a novel in the Northeast corner of Ohio for a while now. Originally, Wish You Were Here -- finally set on Lake Chautauqua in western New York State -- was a small-town novel set in a fictional Lakewood, based on Conneaut, but the scope and focus of the book totally changed. The original opening scene involved a policeman discovering an empty convenience mart, setting off a search that would take the reader deep into the lives of the people closest to the missing clerk. That incident plays a background role in Wish You Were Here, a necessary counterbalance to the mostly pastoral moments of the vacationing Maxwell family, but it's never fleshed out; it's more of an interiorized obsession for one of the (many) characters.
That first use of the missing girl comes directly from the real-life case of Katie Poirier who disappeared from a small town in Minnesota at least a decade ago. I recall one fundraising event the parents or church sponsored involved hundreds of supporters making snow angels as a way of remembering her, which, just having used snow angels as a metaphor for absence and lost innocence, stuck with me, as did her case. As the father of teenagers, I couldn't just file it away as a typical tragedy. As always, I wanted to know how it would really feel to the people closest to her.
The dying small town on the busy interstate -- passed by daily without a second thought by drivers -- has always interested me. I'm the kind of person who wants to stop and find out what people do there, how people live. I've been driving by and through Conneaut, North Kingsville, and Ashtabula for forty years, so when I knew I was going to use it as a backdrop, I figured I'd go out there and roam around like a location scout for a movie. I might not use any of the stuff -- none of the particulars, that is -- but I might catch the mood of the place, or get inspired. It was a good excuse to poke around and look at stuff, talk to people. Kind of like being a spy. I took these pictures in August 2006. There are a lot more, but these give you a decent idea of the area.
Discover Conneaut: Easily the prettiest shot you'll find of the town. It's from Lake Shore Park, where Ed sits in his car and smokes in the winter, looking out over the icy harbor.
North Kingsville, Lake Road: "She loved how, from the bluffs, on a clear day, you could see all the way to Canada."
North Kingsville, Lake Road: "She loved how, from the bluffs, on a clear day, you could see all the way to Canada."
1-90 from the Rte. 7 overpass: "On break, she would stand at the railing of the overpass smoking menthols and watching the trucks flying west into the future…."
The Dairy Queen, Conneaut: This is where Hinch and Marnie work, and where Kim has Lindsay drive during their lesson.
Typical older Conneaut homes: In a down market, these are impossible for Ed to sell.
Typical older Conneaut homes: In a down market, these are impossible for Ed to sell.
North Kingsville: Every road that goes north-south has to cross over two separate sets of tracks. That's how you know you're getting close to the lake. Buses have to come to a full stop before crossing.
Conneaut: The drive-thru of the DQ -- too narrow for Lindsay, just learning how to drive.
Yes, it's real -- the cemetery is right next to the DQ: Kim and Lindsay eat their burgers in the shade of the trees, just to the left of this shot.
Conneaut: Route 7 headed south out of town toward I-90 and Kim's Conoco. This is her drive to work, and the same route the bus full of searchers takes.
Conneaut, off of Route 7: This is the old bridge Ed notices on the way out of town.
Conneaut: This is the back way down to the beach -- the way the kids take at night -- where they can build a fire and look up at the stars over the lake. Note the oreboat, and the lighthouse to the right of it.
Conneaut: This is as close to the postcard as I can get.
Conneaut, Lake Shore Park: The beach. JP fantasizes about walking here with Nina in the winter.
North Kingsville: At night the teenagers come down and build fires and drink beer and talk.
North Kingsville: At night the teenagers come down and build fires and drink beer and talk.
I-90 headed west: Ed drives this stretch when he's first searching for Kim.
Conneaut: This used to be a busy gas station.
Downtown Conneaut: In the middle of a weekday.
Downtown Conneaut: This building had just sold & was going to be developed into "luxury condos."
Downtown Conneaut
Downtown Ashtabula: Main Street in the middle of a weekday. Most of the retailers have surrendered to the mall and the strip along Route 20.
Downtown Conneaut: 7,000 sq. ft. building for sale/lease. This is the real estate market in 2006. Imagine it now.
Conneaut: Blurry (sorry) shot of a Dutch Colonial for sale, much like the one Ed tries to sell when he returns to work.
Conneaut: Vacant light industrial spaces west of town.
North Kingsville: Car carriers from the Canadian Pacific. The tracks run through the woods behind Nina's house.
North Kingsville: The tracks Nina and Elise walk out to the trestle over the Ashtabula River.
Conneaut: "Spartans suck!"
Downtown Conneaut: JP's bus stops here in the snow, but the diner's closed.
Downtown Conneaut: The other side of the diner, showing the newspaper honor boxes.
Downtown Conneaut: In the snow, in the hush after the bus has gone, JP sees the post office steps as an abandoned stage set.
Downtown Conneaut: An even smaller lunch place right across from the diner. This one seems to belong to The Speed Queen.
Conneaut, Lake Shore Park: "Ed had to believe the lake would always bring people back, otherwise he would have moved to Florida."
What do you think? Is it as you imagined while reading the book? Is it much like your own town or where you grew up?
Thanks to Stewart for entrusting us with his album!
About these photos:
I've been meaning to set a novel in the Northeast corner of Ohio for a while now. Originally, Wish You Were Here -- finally set on Lake Chautauqua in western New York State -- was a small-town novel set in a fictional Lakewood, based on Conneaut, but the scope and focus of the book totally changed. The original opening scene involved a policeman discovering an empty convenience mart, setting off a search that would take the reader deep into the lives of the people closest to the missing clerk. That incident plays a background role in Wish You Were Here, a necessary counterbalance to the mostly pastoral moments of the vacationing Maxwell family, but it's never fleshed out; it's more of an interiorized obsession for one of the (many) characters.
That first use of the missing girl comes directly from the real-life case of Katie Poirier who disappeared from a small town in Minnesota at least a decade ago. I recall one fundraising event the parents or church sponsored involved hundreds of supporters making snow angels as a way of remembering her, which, just having used snow angels as a metaphor for absence and lost innocence, stuck with me, as did her case. As the father of teenagers, I couldn't just file it away as a typical tragedy. As always, I wanted to know how it would really feel to the people closest to her.
The dying small town on the busy interstate -- passed by daily without a second thought by drivers -- has always interested me. I'm the kind of person who wants to stop and find out what people do there, how people live. I've been driving by and through Conneaut, North Kingsville, and Ashtabula for forty years, so when I knew I was going to use it as a backdrop, I figured I'd go out there and roam around like a location scout for a movie. I might not use any of the stuff -- none of the particulars, that is -- but I might catch the mood of the place, or get inspired. It was a good excuse to poke around and look at stuff, talk to people. Kind of like being a spy. I took these pictures in August 2006. There are a lot more, but these give you a decent idea of the area.
--Stewart O'Nan
Discover Conneaut: Easily the prettiest shot you'll find of the town. It's from Lake Shore Park, where Ed sits in his car and smokes in the winter, looking out over the icy harbor.
North Kingsville, Lake Road: "She loved how, from the bluffs, on a clear day, you could see all the way to Canada."
North Kingsville, Lake Road: "She loved how, from the bluffs, on a clear day, you could see all the way to Canada."
1-90 from the Rte. 7 overpass: "On break, she would stand at the railing of the overpass smoking menthols and watching the trucks flying west into the future…."
The Dairy Queen, Conneaut: This is where Hinch and Marnie work, and where Kim has Lindsay drive during their lesson.
Typical older Conneaut homes: In a down market, these are impossible for Ed to sell.
Typical older Conneaut homes: In a down market, these are impossible for Ed to sell.
North Kingsville: Every road that goes north-south has to cross over two separate sets of tracks. That's how you know you're getting close to the lake. Buses have to come to a full stop before crossing.
Conneaut: The drive-thru of the DQ -- too narrow for Lindsay, just learning how to drive.
Yes, it's real -- the cemetery is right next to the DQ: Kim and Lindsay eat their burgers in the shade of the trees, just to the left of this shot.
Conneaut: Route 7 headed south out of town toward I-90 and Kim's Conoco. This is her drive to work, and the same route the bus full of searchers takes.
Conneaut, off of Route 7: This is the old bridge Ed notices on the way out of town.
Conneaut: This is the back way down to the beach -- the way the kids take at night -- where they can build a fire and look up at the stars over the lake. Note the oreboat, and the lighthouse to the right of it.
Conneaut: This is as close to the postcard as I can get.
Conneaut, Lake Shore Park: The beach. JP fantasizes about walking here with Nina in the winter.
North Kingsville: At night the teenagers come down and build fires and drink beer and talk.
North Kingsville: At night the teenagers come down and build fires and drink beer and talk.
I-90 headed west: Ed drives this stretch when he's first searching for Kim.
Conneaut: This used to be a busy gas station.
Downtown Conneaut: In the middle of a weekday.
Downtown Conneaut: This building had just sold & was going to be developed into "luxury condos."
Downtown Conneaut
Downtown Ashtabula: Main Street in the middle of a weekday. Most of the retailers have surrendered to the mall and the strip along Route 20.
Downtown Conneaut: 7,000 sq. ft. building for sale/lease. This is the real estate market in 2006. Imagine it now.
Conneaut: Blurry (sorry) shot of a Dutch Colonial for sale, much like the one Ed tries to sell when he returns to work.
Conneaut: Vacant light industrial spaces west of town.
North Kingsville: Car carriers from the Canadian Pacific. The tracks run through the woods behind Nina's house.
North Kingsville: The tracks Nina and Elise walk out to the trestle over the Ashtabula River.
Conneaut: "Spartans suck!"
Downtown Conneaut: JP's bus stops here in the snow, but the diner's closed.
Downtown Conneaut: The other side of the diner, showing the newspaper honor boxes.
Downtown Conneaut: In the snow, in the hush after the bus has gone, JP sees the post office steps as an abandoned stage set.
Downtown Conneaut: An even smaller lunch place right across from the diner. This one seems to belong to The Speed Queen.
Conneaut, Lake Shore Park: "Ed had to believe the lake would always bring people back, otherwise he would have moved to Florida."
Hi Linda, Don't mean to infringe on Mr. O'Nan's comments but I can tell you that I have been to Conneaut Lake Park many times. It is actually located in western PA near the Ohio border. A lot of history there and ambiance. The rides were so quaint and old fashioned with a wonderful carrousel and roller coaster. I say were because about 2 or 3 years ago the park virtually went bankrupt and nobody was able to step in and save it. As far as I know, it's still there but has not reopened. Sad 
Linda10 wrote:Dear Mr. O'Nan,I'll go ahead and ask you this question now. (I was going to ask you this, anyway, next week.) If you're not allowed to answer until then, that's fine. I remember there being a Conneaut Lake Park, too, as a little girl. It was small, but big enough to have amusement rides. Do you know if it's still there?Well, I'll stop there and "talk" to you more next week. Thank you so much for the photos! What a treat!
Carmenere_lady wrote:Hi Linda, Don't mean to infringe on Mr. O'Nan's comments but I can tell you that I have been to Conneaut Lake Park many times. It is actually located in western PA near the Ohio border. A lot of history there and ambiance. The rides were so quaint and old fashioned with a wonderful carrousel and roller coaster. I say were because about 2 or 3 years ago the park virtually went bankrupt and nobody was able to step in and save it. As far as I know, it's still there but has not reopened. SadHi Carmenere lady!Thank you so much for the info! I didn't realize Conneaut Lake Park was actually in Pennsylvania. As a little girl, you don't really pay that much attention to things like that.I do remember one of the rides being something like a Crack-the-Whip. You sat in a cart that went around a rectangular track; and when you got to the corners, it would whip you around. So simple, but so fun!One of the things I was going to save until next week, also, was talking about Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio (where Kim's car was found). The same thing happened there. It was just about ready to go under; then I guess someone came along and rescued it. And it became a huge success again. How sad that Conneaut went the route it did.I'm curious -- where did/do you live that you were able to go to Conneaut many times, as you say?
We travel the I-90 corridor from Cleveland to Erie often enough to take the side roads sometimes and soak up the local sights and wineries! You can see towns like O'Nan's taken in Conneaut throughout NE Ohio and western PA. Like Kingsville in the novel they are quiet rustbelt towns that usually only see alot of activity during the summer months when campers, boaters and ice cream lickers spend the day.
Linda10 wrote:
Carmenere_lady wrote:Hi Linda, Don't mean to infringe on Mr. O'Nan's comments but I can tell you that I have been to Conneaut Lake Park many times. It is actually located in western PA near the Ohio border. A lot of history there and ambiance. The rides were so quaint and old fashioned with a wonderful carrousel and roller coaster. I say were because about 2 or 3 years ago the park virtually went bankrupt and nobody was able to step in and save it. As far as I know, it's still there but has not reopened. SadHi Carmenere lady!Thank you so much for the info! I didn't realize Conneaut Lake Park was actually in Pennsylvania. As a little girl, you don't really pay that much attention to things like that.I do remember one of the rides being something like a Crack-the-Whip. You sat in a cart that went around a rectangular track; and when you got to the corners, it would whip you around. So simple, but so fun!One of the things I was going to save until next week, also, was talking about Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio (where Kim's car was found). The same thing happened there. It was just about ready to go under; then I guess someone came along and rescued it. And it became a huge success again. How sad that Conneaut went the route it did.I'm curious -- where did/do you live that you were able to go to Conneaut many times, as you say?
