Robert W. & Ina L. Stradling's Six Mile House: Families of years past found the Six-Mile-House on Wheeling Pike a convenient stopover on the then exhausting journeys to and from Muncie and the county courthouse. Mr. Robert Stradling, a student of history, researched his farm after moving there and discovered that the farm, located north of Muncie, had once been the site of a small pioneer community called Strasburg more than 150 years ago.

The Early American Museum housed at the Stradling farm was founded in 1962 by Mr. and Mrs. Stradling. At that time, they learned of a two-story log cabin on the farm of Victor Sprong in Hamilton Township. The run-down cabin, unused for many years, was scheduled to be razed. Sprong told Stradling that he could have it, and Stradling and his son-in-law Carl O'Dell, dismantled the cabin log by log, marking each one so it could be replaced in its proper order. The cabin measured 22 ft. long, 18-1/2 ft. wide, and 12-1/2 feet to the cable.

Samuel Stafford, Sr., had built the cabin in 1849. Stafford had come to Hamilton Twp. in Delaware Co., IN, from Ohio. The original logs were of almost every kind of good timber native to the area - oak, walnut, poplar, and blue and white ash. Some original timbers had to be replaced because of deterioration. The fireplace in the restored cabin was built by Arlo and Ralph Barrett of Gaston. The original bricks were not used. Instead, an exterior fireplace was built of bricks and stones from old churches, schools and homes in the community. Inside, the fireplace was built with stones collected by the Stradlings on their travels. The lovely mantel came from a tree sawed on the Stradling farm in 1929. The beams and posts above the fireplace and the walnut and poplar door came from a store in Wheeling thought to be the first one in the area built around 1847. The door was complete with an original latch string. The latch string device was used in the early days and substituted for a door knob. The cabin was opened to guests in September of 1963.