Bensen House — Attraction in Grant-Valkaria

Atley Bensen paid $1,200 for the precut yellow pine lumber which arrived by riverboat from Jacksonville in 1916, to build this house for his wife Clara Christensen. The Bensen brothers married the Christensen sisters, both pioneer families of Grant. Atley and Clara lived in the house with sons, Atley Jr. and Russell until they were school age, and then moved to Melbourne, where son Edward Hartman was born in 1928. The Bensen House was rented for about five years until the family returned. Atley and his brother Adolph were involved in commercial fishing, grew pineapples, and operated the Jorgensen General Store, which opened in 1894. Atley died in 1961. Clara continued to live in the house, and then later moved to Tampa where she died in 1981. Russell donated the "cracker" house to the Grant Historical Society in 1984. In 1985, the house was moved from its original site, which was about 300 feet south of 1st Street on the banks of the Indian River Lagoon to this location, which was the original site of Grant's first house built in 1894 by Louis Kossuth "Honey" Smith. The Smith house burned down in the 1970's. The Bensen House became a museum in 1987. A Florida...

Located on the Indian River Lagoon just east of US 1, sits Grant's oldest house. It's a small wooden structure with some original and some donated early twentieth century furniture and appliances. Don't miss the old pressure cooker and washing machine. There is also a fascinating woven blanket in the master bedroom called a "slave" blanket. The house is not open all the time so check before you go. The volunteers of the Grant Historical Society do a wonderful job of explaining the history...

It wasn't a very big area I did have like a small little dock that let out where you at I guess you can go fishing by the place itself was closed I don't know if it was closed for the day or it was closed but I guess it's from the 1916 and there's a couple of signs that explain the history of it to...