I read “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck in middle school, and the story of Lenny and George never left me. I wondered a lot about Steinbeck’s Salinas Valley. Later, I read the “Grapes of Wrath,” “East of Eden,” and others. Because of these books, I felt I knew the place, though I’d never been there. That was about to change.
As a nomad, I’d traveled throughout the United States for some time when I took the Pacific Coast Highway through northwestern California. It brought me too near to Salinas to ignore. As luck would have it, I’d read that Steinbeck’s boyhood home had recently reopened for visitors that week, which meant I had to go.
The Salinas Valley
I’d been staying in San Jose heading south to San Diego and the drive to the valley added two hours, but it was worth every mile.
It was a typical bright, warm, sunny California day when I drove into Salinas. Unlike some other parts of the state, here, the roads are wide open, and the valley is green as it stretches out before you like an oasis with a golden promise. I had the windows down, so I smelled the valley before I realized I was in it.
At first, I couldn’t figure out what I was smelling. It smelt good, but it was so intense I wondered if some food had come open in my van. Because it smelled like garlic, I thought it must be coming from a soup factory or some restaurant that I couldn’t see. There was nothing on the roadway, just crops I couldn’t identify. Then I saw the signs for the garlic farm. It was so good and pungent a smell that it permeated everything for miles around it. It was wonderful. This was when I realized I entered the Steinbeck’s Salinas Valley.
Entering Steinbeck’s Salinas Valley
I’d recently read some of Steinbeck’s journals and became intrigued with the man. Though he based almost all his books in the Salinas Valley, where he was born and raised, he thought little of the place, as young people often feel about their hometowns, and was glad to get out when he could. Eventually, he moved to New York City, but still, he wrote about Salinas and places like it.
The Salinas Valley is known for being a majorly productive agricultural region in California and for its role in Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath.”
Steinbeck wrote a lot about the migrant workers and crop pickers in the valley – and there are many. It’s sometimes called the “salad bowl of the world.” Crops include garlic, lettuce, peppers, strawberries, tomatoes, grapes, spinach, cauliflower, artichokes, celery and more.
In between two mountain passes, the entire area was filled with all sorts of different farms, lush and green all around me. Soon I started to see the people in the fields harvesting the crops too. They bent over double picking or pulling hoes through the dirt. I was immediately taken aback by the familarity of the pickers.
I’d never seen crop harvesting before, but Steinbeck had written about these people, this lifestyle many times. It hit me suddenly that, of course, these are the people he wrote about. Write what you know, they say, and he did. “The Grapes of Wrath,” for which he won a Pulitzer Prize, could not have come from anyone without an intimate knowledge of the harvester lifestyle.
Town of Salinas, California
Salinas loves Steinbeck now, but they didn’t use to. Of course, they do. It brings visitors like me, who wouldn’t otherwise visit the farmland. During his lifetime, they held book burnings of “The Grapes of Wrath” and later banned it for many years.
Pro tip: If anyone ever tells you not to read a book – go read it immediately. There’s something important in they don’t want you to know.
Today, Oldtown Salinas is home to several historical buildings, restaurants and coffee shops. It maintains the charm of a simpler time. It was well kept and historical, but with modern amenities, wide roads and clean spaces. Unlike in Steinbeck’s time when most everyone was white and upper-middle-class, now nearly everyone appeared to be Latino.
The Steinbeck Center was closed when I was there, but it’s where they house some old manuscripts and other memorabilia of Steinbecks. His family’s old Victorian house, however, still stands on Central Avenue, just a few blocks away amid dozens of lovely old homes. It’s open for visitors.
John Steinbeck Boyhood Home
Steinbeck’s birthplace and boyhood home are restored 4,000-foot Queen Anne style Victorian. He lived there from his birth until going to Stanford University in 1919. It is where he first started writing, in a bedroom upstairs. Today, it’s a charming restaurant, museum and gift shop. They served lunch during limited hours a few times a week, and again, I got lucky.
As an architecture lover, just going into an old house like this is a treat. That a person whose work I admire lived there makes it even better. I’ve also been to Hemingway’s house in Key West, Anne Frank’s house (attic) in Amsterdam, Anne Rice’s house in the New Orleans Garden District, Elvis’s Graceland and birthplace in Tupelo, Mississippi many others. I love to try and understand what made them tick.
While the house is described as middle class, today, its style and size would require more wealth. It’s 4,000 square feet and was luxurious even for its time. It was built in 1897, and Steinbeck was born in a room on the main floor. It’s now a reception area. The bed he was born in is on display in the gift shopnext door.
The Steinbeck House Restaurant
The living room and dining room, and reception area are now a restaurant and the only parts of the house open to visitors. It is decorated as it would have been when Steinbeck was in residence, with Victorian touches like lace and dark, heavy wood. Black and white framed photographs line the walls, and many furnishings are original to the home.
I ordered a sandwich with a salad made from produce fresh from the valley. It was fabulous and served in a spectacular environment by women who clearly love history, literature, and John Steinbeck. Several staffers stopped to talk with me and tell me historical tidbits about the rooms, décor and Steinbeck’s writing. It’s from them that I learned that his ashes were buried in a nearby cemetery, so you know me, I had another stop to make.
Not only do I tour the homes of famous people, but I’m also a taphophile who will use any excuse to visit a cemetery, and I’ve been to some of the best in the world.
Even though Steinbeck wanted to be away from the valley and died in New York City, he still wanted his ashes buried in the family plot at the Garden of Memories Cemetery in Salinas.
Steinbeck Grave in the Garden of Memories
The cemetery was small, and I found his grave easily. Others before me had left pens and pencils, making it easy to spot from a distance. It was a simple stone for a man who thought of himself as simple too. I paid my respects, thanked him for his work, and went back through the verdant Salinas Valley.
Steinbeck’s Salinas Valley was more beautiful than he gave it credit for, but love can be conflicting and hard to describe. To see how it sits between two mountain ranges, filled with green crops down the center and people busily harvesting, was marvelous. But I suppose any place common to you, no matter your love for it, loses its luster, at least for a while.
Conflicted Love in a Verdant Valley
Despite his proclaimed lack of love for the area, after college, he married, moved to his family cottage in nearby Pacific Grove, and began his writing in earnest. He spent most of his life here before moving to New York City.
After he left, he didn’t return for over 20 years and then when he finally did, it was on an epic US road trip he documented in “Travels with Charley.”
In that book, he said he climbed up to the highest peak and said goodbye to the place. He knew he was dying and would never see it again.
“I printed once more on my eyes, south, west, and north, and then we hurried away from the permanent and changeless past where my mother is always shooting a wildcat and father is always burning his name with his love.”
JOhn Steinbeck, travels with charley
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