From the author’s introduction:

I believe that all of us have a spiritual home, and that most of us encounter it at some point in our lives. However, only some of us are lucky enough to recognize it when we see it. When I visited North Adams for the first time on Sunday, July 21, 1996, God said to me, "This is your spiritual home. Come back." Somehow, I must have heard Him.

On a lush, green, cloudless summer day, my wife and I drove two hours from our home in Torrington, Connecticut, to see an art exhibit at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), a developing project we read about in our local newspaper. The article briefly described it as "an art museum that is locating in a complex of abandoned factory buildings."

When we arrived, I was struck by the quiet streets and strange beauty of this small city that sits deep in the shadows of the Berkshires. We parked on Main Street and walked around for a few minutes until we found the museum, only to discover that the newspaper article was incorrect, and that the art exhibit was scheduled to begin the following weekend. MASS MoCA was closed, and it appeared to be nothing more than a bunch of faded brick buildings in desperate need of repair.

We could have jumped into our car and headed home, but my wife and I elected to walk around some more, a decision that was to change my life. After a long afternoon of wandering and discovering, we drove home, booked a motel for the following weekend, and returned Saturday for the art exhibit.

We learned that MASS MoCA was planning to open in 1999, and that it would be the largest contemporary art museum in the United States. I chatted with several people on Main Street, including a store owner who lamented about the city’s decline over the years. "We’re on our way back now," he said, "and MASS MoCA is the reason." In less than three weeks, I was on my way back, too; this time with a camera, a pen, and a pocket notepad.

A year later, I had written and published my first book, Steeples: Sketches of North Adams, which contains interviews I conducted with residents, poems I wrote about the city, and photographs. Steeples turned out to be a very popular book; but more importantly, it gave me the opportunity to make many wonderful friends and to find a spiritual home.

Why North Adams? For this author, there is so much to tell. Echoing in the soft mountains is the classic American story of struggle and triumph. The last thirty years have been an especially challenging time. Starting in 1968, residents witnessed a devastating urban renewal program that wiped out most of its commercial and residential blocks downtown, many of them historic landmarks. Old-timers stood on street corners with their grandchildren and watched as buildings disappeared into dust; buildings these old-timers probably watched being built, stone by stone, with their grandfathers.

Sadly, city officials were unable to deliver on the promise of new development. For many years, the south side of Main Street was in the words of one resident: "The most depressing place I’d ever been in…a big, dirty parking lot."

In 1986, the Sprague Electric Company, which had employed 4,200 workers less than twenty years earlier, abandoned its sprawling thirteen-acre plant located just two blocks from Main Street. Unemployment rates eclipsed those of the Great Depression. Many natives moved south, and once-thriving neighborhoods began a slow and painful disintegration.

It wasn’t until MASS MoCA obtained the long-awaited funding in 1995 that people began to feel a sense of hope. Since the museum opened in 1999 to rave reviews and huge audiences, North Adams has become the talk of the art world and a cultural mecca that is attracting creative young people as well as new and innovative Internet-based companies.