Author fuses history into fiction book set in Butler County
Cecilia Tomko has been a teacher and has written songs and even a musical, but getting further than about 30 pages was the longest literary writing she had done before 2023.
The Butler transplant said she had envisioned a book about the city since her first visit here in the late-1990s — but the story she was hoping for wouldn’t come about unless she did it herself.
“I started writing it in July of 2023, but it has been stirring in me since 1998, the first time I visited Butler,” Tomko said. “When I first saw Butler, I said, ‘Someone should write a book about Butler.’ But I didn’t think it would be me.”
Tomko’s first book, “Sacred Stones,” was released Nov. 4. She describes it as a “redemption story about a fictional family and fictional story,” but heavily uses Butler history and landmarks as backdrops for the 200-plus-page tale. While the book focuses on a fictional family living in Butler in the 1920s, Tomko said she hopes readers familiar and unfamiliar with the area learn something about the once-industrial town.
“The older I get, the more I’m interested in history,” Tomko said. “I’m not trying to replace a history book. A lot of people who read it just said, ‘Wow I learned a little bit about Butler.’”
To write the story, Tomko referenced archive photos, videos and news clippings about locales like the Pullman Standard facilities, some of which are still standing today. Other Butler and Butler County spots also are mentioned, like Cummings Candy & Coffee, the Penn Theater and the Butler County Courthouse.
It was the Penn Theater’s revitalization, which began in 2022, that finally set Tomko on the path of writing the book, she explained.
“When I heard the radio interview with Bryan and Marina Frenchak (Penn Theater owners), I just knew it was time to start,” Tomko said.
Tomko also worked with the Butler County Historical Society to track down archive information.
Mackenzie Herold, outreach coordinator for the Butler County Historical Society, said the organization keeps documents from Butler County governmental agencies and businesses. People looking into a specific place or event that took place in Butler County can likely find it, or get a lead from the Butler County Historical Society’s archives, according to Herold.
“We have directories, yearbooks, plenty of history books about the Bantam Jeep and Pullman Standard,” Herold said. “We have more physical objects, if you’re looking for objects or something about a business here in Butler.”
Herold mentioned Pullman Standard and Bantam as two companies the historical society has information on, the former of which came in handy for Tomko’s writing.
“I got ahold of some old footage and saw people dressed in fancy hats. What you saw was you see the big empty Pullman Building and what that used to be,” Tomko said. “I think I have some funny empathy for big buildings, I want to see them brought back to life.”
The Pullman Standard office building on Hansen Avenue was of particular interest to Tomko, who wrote about a major historical event that took place there in her book.
“The Pullman Building is this thematic piece of the book,” Tomko said. “The first is that there was an explosion in the Pullman building in 1907 that killed seven people. I used that as part of the story.”
Additionally, Tomko used her own house as inspiration for the story. The house was finished around 1912, she said, and still has original architecture including a fireplace and a staircase between the first and second floors.
The book’s narrative interweaves a family’s life into historical events.
The book’s synopsis says Andrew Varga inherits his great-grandmother Lina’s home in Butler, where his 10-year-old daughter, Caroline, begins experiencing visions of the past. Each glimpse of her ancestors leads the Varga family closer to bringing long-buried secrets of theft, deceit and betrayal into the light.
Tomko said the 10-year-old character’s visions helped her implement historical events that took place in the county into the context of the narrative.
“I have a timeline of 60 points going from 1792 to the Penn Theater opening. The focus is from 1902 to 1929,” Tomko said. “What I tried to do was take interesting historical elements and paint a short history of them in the context of a historical story.”
The framing device is also what let Tomko infuse Butler landmarks into the story.
After getting deep into its writing, Tomko said she was able to find a publisher for the story that could print a book and get it to stores, including Amazon. The publishing part was relatively simple, Tomko said, she just prepared the story and paid the fee.
According to Tomko, some people from Butler and her hometown in Virginia have picked up the book. The feedback has been good for people who have not even been to Butler, she said.
“There has been a couple Virginians who have read it now; the feedback is what I wanted, ‘I want to come to Butler now,’” Tomko said. “Hopefully it will do what it intends to do and get Butler on the map.”
The completion of the book isn’t the end for Tomko’s focus on writing about Butler County’s history, she said. She has already branched off into writing a story meant to be read by children.
“I invented a fictional character around Lake Arthur, I got a graphic designer to make a design and make some children's books about Moraine State Park,” Tomko said.
Not one to rest on her literary laurels, Tomko said another book, which she plans to write in a style similar to “Sacred Stones,” also is in the works.
“Three days ago I started working on a follow-up to this book,” Tomko said Friday, Jan. 3.
