Pioneers referred to the area as Langford's Station or Langford's until Stephen laid out city lots in 1810 and donated the property that became known as Mount Vernon, the county seat for Rockcastle. When the settlement was given a city name, patriotic Americans chose to honor George Washington, the first President of the United States of America, by using the name of his estate, Mount Vernon. Washington's home and farm had been built by his father, Augustine, and after Augustine died, his half-brother Lawrence inherited the estate, then called Little Hunting Creek. Lawrence renamed it Mount Vernon to honor Admiral Edmond Vernon, a British soldier he had served under, and used the word mount because the home stood on a hill overlooking the Potomac River. By pioneer standards in the late 1700's, Langford's home resembled the stately Washington home overlooking the Potomac River, and Stephen's log home was a two-story structure with a porch on the second floor, built on a hill overlooking the land that became Mount Vernon, Kentucky.