Jerusalem's Lot (Stephen King)

Jerusalem's Lot (often shortened to 'Salem's Lot or just the Lot) is a fictional town in the works of horror fiction writer Stephen King. The town first appears in the novel 'Salem's Lot, then in the prequel short story "Jerusalem's Lot", and then in the sequel short story "One for the Road". It is then subsequently mentioned in passing in The Shining, The Dead Zone, The Body, Pet Sematary, Dolores Claiborne, Dreamcatcher, and the last three books of the The Dark Tower series (Wolves of the Calla, Song of Susannah, and The Dark Tower). It is also mentioned in Alan Moore's comic The New Traveller's Almanac.

In adaptations, it appears in the 1979 Salem's Lot miniseries and its 1987 sequel A Return to Salem's Lot, the 1995 BBC radio drama, and the 2004 Salem's Lot miniseries.

Together with Castle Rock, Maine and Derry, Maine, it is one of the principal towns in King's fictional Maine topography. In 'Salem's Lot and "One for the Road", it is described as being located in Cumberland County, between (or including parts of) the towns of Falmouth, Windham, and Cumberland, near the southern part of the state about twenty miles north of Portland; however, on the map of Maine at Stephen King's official website, it is placed considerably further north, approximately in Northwest Piscataquis.

King himself has publicly conceded that ‘Salem’s Lot was his own personal favorite of books he has written. In his Playboy interview, the interviewer wrote that King was planning a sequel, but more recently his official website states he has finished the story thread in Wolves of the Calla and Song of Susannah.

The town is mainly prototypical to later King towns, such as Derry and Castle Rock, and is not a commonly used setting for his stories.

Origin and Inspiration

In Danse Macabre, King's non-fiction, semi-autobiographical review of horror in all media forms, King confesses that 'Salem's Lot was largely derived from the town of Durham, Maine; specifically the area in which he resided as a youth known locally as "Methodist Corners." The Marsten House of Salem's Lot was based upon a vacant house of the same name in Methodist Corners; he and his friends had explored the real Marsten House as children.

Fictional history and myth

The town that would become Jerusalem's Lot was founded in 1710 by a preacher named James Boon, the leader of a cult of schismatic Puritans. The cult became notorious in the region for its open embrace of witchcraft and for its amoral sexual practices, including inbreeding. Jerusalem's Lot became an incorporated town in 1765, but was abandoned in 1789 after Boon and his followers mysteriously vanished. The mass disappearance occurred not long after Philip Boone, a wealthy individual and unknowing descendant of James Boon, obtained an occultic book known as De Vermis Mysteriis; Philip Boone disappeared along with the rest of the village.

When Jerusalem's Lot was incorporated in 1765, Maine was still part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The town got its name from a myth about one of the earliest residents, Charles Belknap Tanner, who raised pigs; one of these pigs was named Jerusalem. One day, Jerusalem escaped from her confines into a nearby forest, and became aggressive and wild. Tanner began warning young children who trespassed on his property to "Keep 'ee out o' Jerusalem's wood lot," lest the pig devour them. Eventually, the phrase "Jerusalem's Lot" was adopted as the town name.

At an unknown date sometime after Boone and McCann's exploration, people began inhabiting the town again. The town had a representative named Elias Jointner in the House of Representatives by 1896. As chronicled in the novel 'Salem's Lot, Jerusalem's Lot has been identified as a residence for great and mysterious evil, particularly vampires.