The western Oak Park suburb of Chicago may owe half its fame to the man who designed many of its striking houses – Frank Lloyd Wright. But it owes the other half to being the childhood home of that giant of 20th-century American literature, Ernest Hemingway. He was born here in Oak Park, and attended the nearby Oak Park and River Forest High School. He only wrote five novels, but they made such an impact – and his life was lived to such legendary proportions – that Hemingway became a myth. Coming to his birthplace is one way of getting to know the man.
The house itself is open to guided tours – but a good place to start is at the museum, half-way down North Oak Park Avenue. Housed in the neoclassical splendour of the Oak Park Arts Centre, the museum has a permanent exhibit covering the whole of Hemingway's extraordinary life. Especially treasured is the childhood diary, written while living in Oak Park, and a letter from his first love lost (Hemingway had four wives), nurse Agnes von Kurowsky.
It was young Ernest's expeditions into the nearby woods and lakes where his adventurous spirit was first-shown. That drive for excitement, novelty and insight drove him to adventures in World War I Italy, the Spanish Civil War, across Europe in World War II, and on to near-death experiences in Africa. The museum covers all these, along with an in-depth look at his novels such as The Sun Also Rises, and For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Just up the street from the museum, the Birthplace Home itself is in the 'Queen Anne' style, which was fashionable when built by Hemingway's grandparents. It is a beautiful and richly-decorated house, and you can book a tour round these restored rooms, which helped form Ernest's earliest memories. But perhaps more evocative of where Hemingway would take his writing are the sparse lines of the modern Prairie-style house the family then moved to. Known for his simple direct approach to writing, it's nice to think that near-neighbour Frank Lloyd Wright, with his similarly direct simplicity to building houses, would influence one of America's finest authors.
