Preserving History

Rippon Lodge Historic Site on Blackburn Road had a long association with the King’s Highway, a segment of which cut directly through the property when the Blackburn family lived there during the 18th century. The family depended on the road for mail delivery, owned horses and carriages for travel, and used the route for business and pleasure. The road connected urban centers including Boston, Philadelphia, Alexandria, Dumfries, Richmond, and Williamsburg. Judge Wade Hampton Ellis, born in 1865, owned Rippon Lodge from 1924 until his death in 1948 and took a strong interest in preserving the 18th-century King’s Highway. Working with the Daughters of the American Revolution, he helped install a commemorative plaque in 1933 for the old road, which a newspaper notice for the unveiling called the oldest post road in northern Virginia and said ran two miles through the grounds of Rippon Lodge and from Mount Vernon to Richmond.

Woodbridge, Virginia · United States