The Hegeler Carus Mansion, located at 1307 Seventh Street in La Salle, Illinois is one of the Midwest's great Second Empire structures.

In 1887, Hegeler launched the Open Court Publishing Company to provide a forum for the discussion of philosophy, science and religion, and hired the German scholar Dr. Paul Carus to serve as managing editor.

[7] The mansion is where Carus wrote over 70 books, countless articles and served as editor of two scholarly publications, The Open Court and The Monist.

Carus invited editorial contributions from the likes of Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, Leo Tolstoy, F. Max Müller, Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell.

Carus hosted a historical meeting of East and West immediately after the 1893 Chicago Columbian Exposition, bringing together eminent Oriental religious scholars.

[10][11][12] In 2008, the foundation launched a project to reassemble the mansion's gymnasium and its apparatus, considered to be a unique surviving example of a late 19th-century turnverein-style physical culture facility.