John C. Blanchard / John and Harriet Blanchard House
John Celsus Blanchard (1822-1905) epitomizes the American “self-made man.” He left his home in Cayuga County, New York, at age fourteen, bound for the western frontier. Blanchard worked as a laborer in Detroit, Livingston and Shiawassee Counties before walking sixty miles to the U.S. Land Office at Ionia. Using $50 of the $53 he had saved, he purchased forty acres of land in 1837. Two years later he began “reading the law” as a student in the law offices of Roof and Bell in Lyons. His appointment as Ionia County prosecuting attorney in 1850 began a distinguished public career. That year Blanchard and his wife, Harriet, moved to Ionia where they devoted themselves to civic affairs and became generous benefactors to churches and schools, including Albion College.The brick walls of this substantial Italianate house are veneered with variegated sandstone selected by John Blanchard from the Ionia Sandstone Quarry, which he co-owned. The house stands where the Blanchards’ first Ionia home was located. In 1880 they moved that house to the back of the lot and began constructing this elegant residence, completed in 1881. The house looks much as it did when the Blanchards lived here and retains many original interior features, such as brass chandeliers, faux marble fireplaces and walnut shutters. In 1974 the Ionia County Historical Society purchased the house. The Blanchard House is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Plaque via Michigan History Center