Morven Park
A museum, cultural center, and equestrian institute

Morven Park was home to two governors: Thomas Swann Jr., a Civil-War era governor of Maryland, and Virginia's Westmoreland Davis, who served his gubernatorial term from 1918 to 1922.

The mansion, the focal point of the estate, evolved from a fieldstone farmhouse built in 1781 to its present turn-of-the-century appearance.

The first owner of the farmhouse was Wilson Cary Seldon. Thomas Swann Sr. acquired the property in 1800 and added several rooms and the Greek Revival style portico between 1800 and 1820. Circa 1860, Swann's son, Thomas Swann, Jr., later governor of Maryland, engaged Baltimore architect Edmund G. Lind to remodel the house into a grand mansion in the Italianate style.

The plantation in the early months of the Civil War was home to Confederate troops of the 17th Mississippi Regiment. The front lawn was used as drilling and review grounds by the Southern soldiers. Known as "Swan's Castle" by the troops because of the Italianate style towers on the house, Morven Park provided living space for officers in the mansion, while more than fifty log huts housed soldiers in the woods behind the house.

From the time he acquired the property in 1903, Westmoreland Davis set a standard for grand living. He also made Morven Park a model dairy farm and an agricultural showplace.

In 1955, Governor Davis's widow established the Westmoreland Davis Memorial Foundation, Park was opened to the public as a museum, cultural center, and equestrian institute in 1967. Exhibits open to the public include the mansion as it was furnished in the early 20th century, the Winmill Carriage Collection, the Museum of Hounds and Hunting, and a Civil War encampment.