the spring of 1958

The spring of 1958 in Derry, Maine, is the season of awakening that precedes the summer of horror. It is a time of lingering winter cold, the first thaw, and the slow return of life to the Barrens. For the Losers' Club, it is the season when each member first encounters the entity that will define their summer—Ben sees the mummy on the frozen Canal, Eddie meets the leper under the Neibolt Street porch, Stan confronts the dead boys in the Standpipe, and Mike is attacked by the giant bird at the Kitchener Ironworks. It is also the season of the first murders of the new cycle, beginning with George Denbrough's death the previous autumn and continuing through the winter and spring. The spring of 1958 is the threshold between ordinary childhood and the extraordinary terror that will bind seven children together.

The Season of First Encounters

For each member of what will become the Losers' Club, the spring of 1958 is the season of their first direct encounter with the entity that haunts Derry. Ben Hanscom, walking home from school on a bitterly cold January afternoon, sees a figure in a silver clown suit standing on the ice of the frozen Canal, holding balloons that float against the wind. The figure, which Ben perceives as a mummy, calls to him and reaches for him, but he escapes when the five o'clock whistle blows. Eddie Kaspbrak, exploring the abandoned house at 29 Neibolt Street in the spring, crawls under the porch and sees a leper's face in a cellar window; the leper crawls out after him, its rotting flesh crawling with beetles, and Eddie flees in terror. Stanley Uris, on a rainy April evening, goes to Memorial Park to watch birds and finds the door to the Standpipe open; inside, he hears calliope music and sees two dead boys in rotting jeans, their hands dangling orange pompoms, coming down the stairs toward him. Mike Hanlon, sent by his father to explore the ruins of the Kitchener Ironworks in May, is attacked by a giant bird with an orange chest and a silver tongue, which he barely escapes by hiding in a fallen smokestack. These encounters are not shared; each child suffers alone, believing they may be going mad.

The Cycle of Violence Begins

The spring of 1958 is also the season when the cycle of violence that began with George Denbrough's murder in October 1957 continues to unfold. The body of Betty Ripsom, a thirteen-year-old girl, is found frozen into the muddy earth on Outer Jackson Street the day after Christmas. In late March, the body of Cheryl Lamonica, sixteen, is found in a stream east of Derry, her forearm hooked by a fisherman. In late April, the body of three-year-old Matthew Clements is discovered in a culvert on Merit Street, his tricycle overturned on the sidewalk where he was last seen. In late May, the body of nine-year-old Veronica Grogan is found in a stormdrain on Neibolt Street. The town is gripped by fear; a seven o'clock curfew is imposed, and parents warn their children not to talk to strangers. Ben Hanscom's mother gives him a Timex watch and tells him to be home by supper every day. The police hunt for a psychopath, but the murders remain unsolved.

The Threshold of Summer

As the spring of 1958 draws to a close, the children of Derry prepare for summer vacation. The last day of school arrives in June, and Ben Hanscom, having survived Henry Bowers's attempt to carve his name into Ben's stomach, escapes into the Barrens. There he meets Bill Denbrough and Eddie Kaspbrak, who are building a dam. The three boys become friends, and the following day they begin construction on a proper dam, using boards and rocks. Richie Tozier and Stanley Uris join them, and the Losers' Club is born. The spring of 1958 ends with the promise of summer—a summer that will bring the seven children together to face the entity that has haunted their individual nightmares. The season of first encounters gives way to the season of shared confrontation.