Punderson State Park in Newbury, Ohio August 27-29, 2025

We left the Wayne County Fairgrounds Campground around 11 am on Wednesday August 27th to make a 3 1/2 hour drive to Punderson State Park in Newbury, Ohio for a short, two-night stay. We’re making this stop for one reason and one reason only.

It was a nice drive along the shores of Lake Erie going from Michigan into Ohio. We passed a nuclear power plant and cooling tower on the way. I felt a little tingle as we drove by.

Punderson State Park

Punderson State Park is a 741-acre public recreation area located in Newbury, Ohio and is the closest state park to Cleveland, Ohio which was our main destination. Major features of the park are its 150-acre natural glacier kettle lake (which only allows electric motorized boats) with facilities for swimming, fishing, a resort manor house (rumored to be haunted) with restaurant, cabins, golf course, and campground.

If, like me, you are not familiar with exactly what a “glacier kettle lake” is, this link explains.

The campground was really the only thing we’d be seeing (and not much of that) during our two-night stay.

There are 201 campsites in the campground and the majority of them have only electric hook-ups, though a few have water and electric and a few have full hook-ups. This is because during winter months there is no water service to the campground, though you can still camp during that time. Our site was one of the electric-only ones, but that was no problem as we had a full fresh water tank and would not be here that long.

We arrived around 3 pm and were in site 79, circled in blue on the map in the photo album. The site is VERY unlevel AND shorter than we expected because the room that we could use to back up farther into the site is lost due to the slope of the land leading to the picnic table and fire pit behind the site.

But we’re only here for two nights, so, we’ll live with it.

Thursday morning, August 28th, we took Bella on a hike along the Erie Trail in the campground. It was a beautiful hike with lots of gorgeous scenery. At least until we came across someone’s retainer on the ground, lol! Having never worn a retainer I am not sure how a person could lose one without knowing it immediately, but there it was gleaming grotesquely in the morning sunlight.

Up, Up, And Away!

After the hike we all three piled into Voyager for a 35-mile drive to Cleveland, Ohio to see the childhood homes of the two men (boys at the time), Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, who created the first and greatest superhero of all time…Superman!

I’ve been wanting to make this pilgrimage ever since we started traveling across the country in our RV. We finally were able to add it to our route when planning for this year’s trip (hats off to my wonderful wife for her tireless work in planning our trips each year) and if you know what a huge fan of Superman I am then you can imagine how excited I was for this stop.

Jerry Siegel

Our first stop was the home of writer Jerry Siegel. The current owners, as you can see in the photos, have decorated the home with a great deal of Superman memorabilia, and a nice sign in the shape of Superman’s chest shield that tells the story of the home. I have to mention that I found it mildly amusing that they have a home security service sign planted in the front yard near the Superman shield.

Joe Shuster

Next we drove less than a mile away to the childhood home of artist Joe Shuster. The fence around the home is decorated with oversized comic book panels of the first story in which Superman appeared; Action Comics #1. In addition there is a sign in the middle the same size as the comic book panels that explains a little about Joe and his friend Jerry and their creation, Superman!

We also found a couple of “Super” street signs here; one for Joe Shuster Lane (Amor Street) and one for Lois Lane (Parkwood). I am assuming that is because Joe based his drawings of Lois Lane on a girl (Joanne Carter) who lived nearby that modeled for Joe when he created Lois. Joanne later became Joanne Siegel after marrying Jerry.

Superman Plaza

While I had been wanting to visit these important places in history (at least for a comic book fan, lol) for a very long time, we had one more stop to make. One that had just come into being at the beginning of August.

Superman Plaza in downtown Cleveland, near the Huntington Convention Center and across from the Cleveland Police Department building, was just dedicated on August 2, 2025. The plaza features a life-sized stainless steel figure of Superman flying away (atop an 18 foot tall blue pillar) from a telephone booth as bronze statues of Jerry Siegel, Joe Shuster, and Joanne Siegel watch and point at the departing Man of Steel.

It’s pretty damn cool looking!

Afterward I was going to look for a place we could eat lunch at in Cleveland, but both Cindy and Bella were uneasy in Cleveland. Cindy could vocalize hers but Bella was also acting extremely anxious, which is not at all like her. So, I listened to my two girls and we didn’t hang around the city after we were finished getting the photos I wanted for this post.

Not sure what energy they were each feeling that caused their uneasiness, but I have no sensitivity it seems to that type of thing so I followed their feelings and we drove back to the campground.

But I think I will always remember the joy I felt in visiting the birthplace of my favorite fictional character; the Man of Tomorrow, the Man of Steel, the Last Son of Krypton…Superman!

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