Gleb Uspensky, a renowned Russian writer, author of essays, stories, and novellas, was born in Tula to a provincial official's family. He entered St. Petersburg University and around the same time began publishing. His literary career started with the story "The Junk Dealer," published in the magazine "Zritel." Later, Uspensky worked in the magazines "Severное Siyaniye," "Russkoye Slovo," Nekrasov's "Sovremennik," and "Otechestvennye Zapiski."

In 1881, the writer purchased a house in the village of Syabrenitsy from a familiar official, Malinovsky. This house, the only two-story one in the village, came with 1.5 desyatinas of land. Settling there, Uspensky studied the lives of local peasants and workers of the Chudov factories. The collected materials formed the basis for such books as "The Power of the Land," "Living Figures," "Petya's Career," "A Quarter of a Horse," and others. However, he lived in Syabrenitsy for a short time, only from 1881 to 1882.

Uspensky's house was often visited by notable figures of the time. Among them were artist N.A. Yaroshenko, who painted portraits of the writer and his elder daughter, writers V.M. Garshin, V.G. Korolenko, and N.K. Mikhailovsky, composer V.S. Serov, and his son V. Serov, who later became a famous artist. Uspensky also frequently hosted revolutionary Narodniks, such as Andrei Zhelyabov, Sofia Perovskaya, and Nikolai Kibalchich, which led to the writer being under unofficial police surveillance.

The museum in Syabrenitsy was opened in 1935. It includes a literary exhibition dedicated to Uspensky's life and work, as well as memorial rooms: the writer's study, his wife A.V. Uspenskaya's room, a dining-living room, and a kitchen. The memorial rooms feature the writer's personal belongings, his books, paintings, and lifetime editions of his works. During the Great Patriotic War, the village was occupied by German troops, who set up a hospital in the museum building and cut down the garden. The museum was restored only in 1967.