Museum of the Grand Prairie

The Museum of the Grand Prairie collects, preserves, and interprets the natural and cultural history of Champaign County and East Central Illinois. Accredited by the American Alliance of Museums since 1972, the Museum of the Grand Prairie has interactive exhibits that engage visitors from ages 2 through 102! Exhibits include The Grand Prairie Story, interpreting the history of the region from the Ice Age through the present day. Champaign County's Lincoln, discussing what the region was like during the 1850s as Lincoln rode the Eighth Judicial Circuit through Champaign County. Discovering Home, an engaging and highly interactive exhibit where visitors of all ages can explore a variety of homes from a wigwam to a log cabin as well as explore ways people across our area's history have communicated with and traveled to and from their homes. Historic Hensley Town Hall that has been reconfigured as our one-room schoolhouse that also doubles as an exhibit and a space where school marms/masters conduct first-person interpretations of 19th century school lessons. Blacksmithing on the Prairie recreates the Chesebro Blacksmith Shop, formerly of Saunemin, Illinois, and tells the story of this central Illinois family as well as its experience in the blacksmith business. Our current special exhibit is titled How Long Museum Women Wait? Woman Suffrage and Women's Rights in Champaign County. This exhibit commemorates the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment’s ratification! This exhibit explores the woman suffrage movement, locally and nationally, as only one landmark in a long continuing struggle for women, and other marginalized people, to claim an equal role in society.