We’ve been celebrating our 30th anniversary all April long! Our birthday was just last Friday. As part of the fun, we’ve been meeting with former OVC Board members, and some others who have been along for the ride. We’re reflecting on three decades of tourism and considering what the future might hold. Join us for a look back on local tourism’s evolution, some Ottawa Visitors Center history, and a special guest’s unique perspectives.

Our special guest this entry is Laura Johnson, of Starved Rock Hot Glass. Laura is a local small business owner and artist. Her workshop has become an attraction all of its own. She got us started with some background information on her time in Ottawa and running her business.

“I am born and raised in Ottawa. My parents were small business owners, which led to me being a small business owner. Grew up in Ottawa. We love it here. So, I definitely wanted to continue and pursue my passions right here in my hometown. I’ve been here in business for 17 years now, so quite a while. And I have been absolutely blessed with the amount of support that I receive, not only from the local community, but from people that come from out of town, tourists. I do online sales. So really, I’ve just been super lucky to be here for this long, and I’m still doing what I love every day. So I can’t really beat that,” Laura said,

Ottawa’s one-of-a-kind community is all part of what makes the town so special. Many describe the city as having a small town charm, with big city amenities. When visitors come into the office, we’re always happy to point them towards a unique shop like Laura’s. With her local business experience in mind, we asked what Ottawa tourism means to Laura.

“Hugely important to any small business, is having that touristy traffic come through. So from the jump when I was creating my business, we knew how important it was going to be to tie in with the Starved Rock tourism. Directly out of that wanting to tie into the great tourism that we have in town. With the state parks around us and just with our local community, obviously the Visitor Center does a great job of promoting our town and what we have to offer,” she said.

“And you would be surprised by how many people I have come through here, that are not from here. And they come here, because they found out about my business or other things in town as quaint it is. So I really pride myself on offering one of the more unique businesses in town and to attract new people, new customers to come here, because as soon as they come here, the next thing I do is, I send them to the other businesses in town because that’s what we do as small business owners. We have to help, and support, and promote each other. So anytime anybody comes to me, I say, ‘Oh, have you checked out Open Space Gallery? Have you checked out Small Dog Candle? Have you checked out Grateful Clay?’ A great thing about being in a small town too, is we all really support each other.”

It’s taken a lot for Ottawa to get to where it is now, but unique places like Starved Rock Hot Glass are what have helped develop the town’s identity in the modern era. This element of small businesses supporting each other certainly plays a significant role in how the city has changed. We asked Laura how she has seen tourism in Ottawa evolve over the years.

“It’s definitely grown a lot. We’ve been hiking at Starved Rock my entire life, and when we used to hike, there’d be nobody there. There wasn’t a huge tourist crowd. And then, over the years, Starved Rock has just exploded, with people and visitors coming from all over the world to see Starved Rock. So that has been a huge impact on our small businesses here in town, getting that huge boost of tourism, especially every summer, when the traffic really picks up. It makes a big difference here in our town. And so promoting the touristy traffic to come through here, see what we have to offer, that’s always a big, important thing for any small town,” Laura explained.

In an almost circular way, growing tourism can help feed back into the community, creating more things for tourists and locals to enjoy. This can be seen through the development of Ottawa’s growing arts movement, which has seen a boom within the last few years alone. In fact, with our murals going up, art sculptures, monuments, and more – it almost feels like Ottawa was destined to become an artistic city. We asked Laura her thoughts on the arts growing in Ottawa.

“When I started 17 years ago, there wasn’t a whole lot of art studios around, because it was risky opening up a business solely on just my art and, hoping for it to be successful and survive. You just weren’t sure, especially back in the day. So now that we have this huge artist community in town, I’m so grateful for it because, like I said earlier, it’s such a perfect network to send people to. If I don’t have what you need, check out Grateful Clay. They might have what you need. And, again, that’s what’s great about being in a small town. There’s not a huge competition, competing with each other, trying to undercut each other. We’re all just here trying to help, survive, support,” she said.

“So the fact that our art community has grown so much, it’s just so many more arms to our network that we can kind of get help, get advice, get customers from. So it’s a great place to be when you’re surrounded by a lot of other local artists. Because again, I started when there wasn’t very many. So now being on the other side. It’s much better. It’s much better being able to have a whole community of artists, people that want to help, want to support, and want to make sure our art community thrives.”

And the art community has certainly been thriving lately! When tourism grows, more things are offered for the local region. With both growing together, we’ve seen more fusions of things like art and events. Ottawa’s first En Plein Aire Art Festival was held last year, and the Ottawa Center for the Arts recently opened. With this in mind, we asked Laura if she has a favorite event or attraction in town.

“Art in the Park was always my favorite. And then once I got so busy with my own store and I started to teach lessons, I started to let other people display at Art in the Park, so that was always a huge thing for me. Every summer you set up your work and it was a great way for me to get my name out there in the beginning, especially with my business being a little bit off the downtown. It was a great way for me to get my stuff right downtown, get people aware of me, and figure out where I’m at, what I do. I always looked forward to Art in the Park every year, and it was always a good boost of business for me, and obviously being in Washington Park is such a beautiful place. That’s another thing that I send people to, and people come in and say, ‘Hey, we just want to kind of walk around town. Where’s a good spot?’ And I tell everybody, ‘Go check out Washington Park, it’s a beautiful spot with the water fountain. And then you can kind of just mosey down the street and check out the businesses and restaurants that are just right down the way.’ So that’s a great place that I send all my touristy traffic to, and that way they can kind of hit the downtown strip,” Laura said.

Ottawa’s tight-knit community is truly what makes tourism work in town. Supporting each other helps ensure that we can all succeed. It especially helps make Ottawa’s history of exciting events and attractions that much more iconic. We asked Laura if there were any old events or attractions in town that she would like to see return, or if she’d prefer to see something new.

“Obviously, everybody wants the old Riverfest back, and I think we do something similar to that nowadays, but yeah, I always appreciated that. Riverfest, Art in the Park, the book sale, that was just always such a fun weekend that everybody looked forward to. So anything like that, that can really kind of keep promoting the artist community, and especially people that don’t have retail locations. It gives them a chance to get their stuff out there, and show people what they’re making. But that was always a huge one for our local community, was Art in the Park.”

With much on the horizon for Ottawa, both near and far, whatever comes next is sure to be a hit. As Ottawa grows as an art tourism destination, we’re sure to see more and more art related events pop up! We can’t wait to see what exciting things the community will come up with next. To close out our interview, we asked Laura if she had any final thoughts on the future of Ottawa and tourism.

“I feel like I just hope to just continue to see it to grow and advance the way that it has. Not only with the art community, but with the restaurants and everything that have just really been booming downtown, and new things I feel like are popping up all the time. And that’s what you need as a small town. Constant change, new stuff, new things coming out, getting people excited to come visit the town. Like we are moving in the right direction and we just keep going with what we’re doing now.”

Many thanks to Laura! We’re so proud share this great community with others, and so thankful for 30 years in the Middle of Everywhere. This interview marks the end of the usual portion of the series, but our next couple will have a few surprises! Stay tuned on the rest of our blog and our Facebook page.