40 US Historical Homes That Are Worth the Visit

11.American Gothic House

Apart from art historians, few people likely realize the classic farmhouse perched behind the creepy couple in American Gothic is still standing peacefully in rural Iowa. It is in the same location as when Grant Wood originally stumbled upon it while touring the state for inspiration in the Summer of 1930. An Iowa native himself, Wood found the house on a drive and was struck by the strangeness of seeing classical Gothic architecture on a clapboard farmhouse. Also notable, Nan Wood Graham and Dr. Byron McKeeby, the couple featured in the painting, were neither related nor were the residence occupants. The owners, Selma Jones-Johnson and family, would permit Wood to use the home in a series he referred to as “cardboardy frame houses on Iowa Farms.”

Wood only visited the house twice, which stands in Eldon, Iowa, twice. Noting the house had “the kind of people [he} fancied should live in that house” Wood sketched the home on paperboard while altering the roofline to accentuate the sizeable gothic window. The foreground subjects were his sister and his dentist, whom he recruited and dressed in period clothing. He finished the oil painting in his Cedar Rapids, Iowa studio. Various caretaker owners have rented the house throughout the years, but many people still drive out to rural Wapello County to see the iconic front of the home. Read on. Leaving the rolling cornfields behind, we’re off to Phoenix, Arizona.