JINAN - A Chinese cultural center will be launched at the Sino-US Friendship House in Muscatine, Iowa, the China Confucius Foundation said Tuesday.

The Sino-US Friendship House opened to visitors earlier in September in the Midwestern US town with a population of about 20,000. The town has become well-known in China because of Chinese President Xi Jinping's two visits there before he took office in March 2013.

The friendship house is the first museum in the US devoted to China-US friendship, and an overseas cultural center will be launched at the museum in November to serve as a window into Chinese culture, said Li Changming, deputy director of the foundation.

In 1985, Xi visited Muscatine with a Chinese delegation when he was working in Zhengding in north China's Hebei Province. Xi lived at the house during that time and received a warm welcome. The couple who owned the house moved to Florida after selling it to the China Window Group, a company for promoting Sino-American exchange activities.

Xi's second visit to Muscatine was in 2012, when Xi was vice president of China.