Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Granger House Museum is the only fully-restored, middle-class family home in southeastern Iowa. Occupied by a single family for nearly 100 years, the house contains many of its original furnishings and is arranged to reflect the lifestyle of a successful, late 19th-century middle-class family. Behind the home is an 1879 brick carriage house which contains a variety of artifacts revealing the occupant's involvement with Morgan horses, dairying, and farming.

We are a Blue Star Museum.

Our mission is to preserve, protect, and promote the history of Marion and to assure that this legacy is passed on to future generations.

Earl and Dora Granger moved into the house in 1873, and they or their children lived here until 1969. They were not famous nor wealthy; they were a fairly average middle-class family, the sort with which many Americans today would probably identify. Earl Granger was, in the language of the 19th century, a self-made man who operated a slaughterhouse and was a partner in a meat market. His wife, Dora, was a German immigrant whose primary responsibility was to raise morally upright children while making her husband look good by creating a beautiful, well-appointed home. They patterned their lives along the social expectations created by other members of the middle-class, and tried to instill these same ideals in their children.

The experiences of the Granger family are not much different than those of their neighbors or even other middle-class families across the Midwest. To learn more about their story and how others like them influenced the creation of today's Middle Class, plan to visit the Granger House Museum at your earliest convenience. We'll be expecting you!