Before the Michener Museum was constructed, there existed another building on the property. According to legend, the site was once a Native American habitat, later owned by two freed slaves of Supreme Court Justice Jeremiah Langhorne who willed them the property in 1842. The county government eventually acquired it and hired a Quaker architect to design a jail with 40 tiny windowless cells with low doors that forced inmates to bow upon entering, an act of purposeful Quaker humility. Built into the perimeter wall was a two-story home and guard tower for the sheriff. The jail operated up until the 1970s when the jail became overcrowded and was closed by the federal government which deemed the living conditions to be "inhumane". Not long after, in 1988, with the support of many dedicated citizens, the Michener Art Museum opened as an independent, non-profit cultural institution dedicated to preserving, interpreting and exhibiting the art and cultural heritage of the Bucks County region. Thanks to the help of Pulitzer Prize-winning author James A. Michener, who first dreamed of establishing a regional art museum in the early 1960s, the museum was gifted a $1 million endowment and would continue to be given endowments over the course of years. Currently, the Michener Museum is home to the largest public collection of Pennsylvania Impressionist paintings, and its great stone walls and façade are still intact and visited annually by more than 135,000 visitors from around the world.

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