Northboro (Part 2 of 7)

As I said in the prior entry, I'm going to be in Northboro, MA, visiting schools all week. I'm really, really, really excited about this. Northboro is the town I grew up in. It's the place where I started writing. And it's my main character's hometown too.

Julie Marchen lives on West Street. Her friend Gillian lives around the corner on Crawford Street (also coincidentally, in the same house that I grew up in). They eat extra-cheesy pizza from the Northboro House of Pizza and drink cherry Slush Puppies from Lowe's Meat Market. They buy school supplies and toothpaste at the CVS next to Julie's mom's hair salon, they see the Agway rooster every day, and they attend Melican Middle School...

Today's photo from Northboro is Julie's school (featured in chapter three of INTO THE WILD):

Julie's School

I'll be visiting Melican on Friday.

When I lived in Northboro, it was actually just called the Northboro Middle School. "Melican" is a new addition to the name. You may also note that the town is spelled "Northborough" on the sign. Northborough was always the official name of the town, but we always dropped the "ugh." Not sure when the "ugh" came back into fashion. Guess today's Northboro(ugh) residents are much classier than we were. :)