Maryland

Mt. Pleasant, Centreville, Maryland 39.012971, -75.999338

Primary House Felling dates: Spring 1813, Summer 1812

Site Master 1689-1812 (white oak) MPCMx1 (t = 7.77 EASTSHOR; 7.54 LMP; 6.70 HKMDx1).

Building description provided by Barton Ross.):

Mt. Pleasant is an historic farmhouse located on the Ruthsburg Road near Centreville, Maryland. Part of an original 383-acre tract of land that dates back to the 1600s, the current house was constructed by Daniel Cox Hopper, enlarging an older gambrel roofed wood frame structure built in the 1760s. Hopper (1777-1849) was a prominent local attorney, planter, member of the Maryland House of Delegates, and a Lieutenant in the Maryland Militia during the War of 1812. His gable roofed main house is typical of the five-bay, two-story brick houses built during the second half of the 18th century on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, exhibiting a few individual features. Its main floor joists are massively oversized for the period and completely original, exhibiting no sagging and requiring no structural interventions in its history. Other unique architectural elements include a rare, twin-columned Federal mantel in the west parlor with finely reeded, intricate detailing; an original, open-string main staircase decorated with wave-pattern stringer brackets; and evidence of header brick put-log holes, or early scaffolding supports, on the main (north) Flemish-bond façade. Many of the fireplace mantels, moldings, and wood trim are original throughout the house. Later additions include an abutting 2-1/2 story brick kitchen addition which dates from the 1870s, a 1940s enclosed porch off the rear elevation, and a late 19th-century log smokehouse. Today the house retains 2.72 acres and is still surrounded on all sides by farm fields, retaining its original setting and viewsheds in the landscape which has remained unchanged for over two hundred years. .

Dendrochronological analysis has shown that the building was constructed from timbers felled in the summer of 1812 and the spring of 1813.

Worthington, M J and Seiter, J I 2025 “The Tree-Ring Dating of Mt. Pleasant, Centreville, Maryland ”, unpublished Oxford Tree-Ring Laboratory archive report 2025/20

---

Oxford

Tree-Ring

Laboratory

The Oxford Tree-Ring Laboratory was formed in 2010 by Michael Worthington and Jane Seiter to provide cutting-edge dendrochronological services to architectural historians READ MORE

Contact Information

Oxford Tree-Ring Laboratory

e-mail:
michael@dendrochronology.com jane@dendrochronology.com

Address

25 E Montgomery St.
Baltimore, MD 21230

410 929 1520