Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site Revenue and Competitors

We are a not-for-profit, tax-exempt organization, whose purpose is to maintain and preserve the Harrison home, collections and grounds as a museum and memorial to the only president of the United States elected from Indiana. Open to the public as an educational and historical service, we seek to promote patriotism and citizenship through appropriate educational activities and by artfully exhibiting the Victorian time period as Harrison and his family might have experienced it. Benjamin and Caroline Harrison built the home in 1874-1875. Benjamin lived in the home until he died in 1901, except for his U.S. Senate and presidential years. His family continued to live in the home until 1913. His second wife, Mary Lord Harrison, made the home a rental property until 1937, when she sold it to the Jordan Conservatory of Music with the understanding that the home and its artifacts would be forever preserved. The school used the home as a dormitory while maintaining certain rooms as presidential museum space. In 1966, a not-for-profit operating foundation was established to run the home as a historic site open to the public. From the 1950s until 1974, tours were by appointment only. After a 1974 renovation, the entire home was opened as a museum for regular daily tours.