GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — The Heritage Hill neighborhood is full of historic homes, but none stand out quite like the Sweet House.
The house is packed full of Grand Rapids relics: Paintings by West Michigan’s world-renowned artist Mathias Alten , a dining table that has served four U.S. presidents, even four gypsum medallions that celebrate a part of the city’s first industry. But the house itself is also a piece of history.
The Sweet House, which was built in the 1860s and still stands at the corner of East Fulton Street and Lafayette Avenue, is named after its first owner: Martin Sweet. Thanks to the work by the Grand Rapids Women’s City Club , which bought the building in 1927, it keeps his story and an era of life in the city alive.
WHO WAS MARTIN SWEET?
Martin Luther Sweet was born in New York in 1819. The son of a miller, Sweet used the family trade to get himself established but used his dreams to carry him to riches.
Sweet had ventured away from New York multiple times, looking for his “land of opportunity.” He found it in Grand Rapids in 1846.