page_title: Sion Hill
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Sion Hill / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Historic American Buildings Survey E. H. Pickering, Photographer September 1936 1ST. FLOOR HALL. - Sion Hill, 2026 Level Road, Havre de Grace, Harford County, MD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sion_Hill
context_page_description: Sion Hill is a National Historic Landmark in Havre de Grace, Maryland, notable as an example of high-style Federal architecture and as the home of a family of prominent officers of the United States Navy.
  Work began at Sion Hill around 1785 for the Rev. John Ireland, but progressed slowly, as the unfinished house was sold in 1795 to Gordon Denison. In 1799 the still-unfinished house passed to Denison's daughter Minerva, who was to marry Commodore John Rodgers in 1806. Together, they finished the house. Descendants of John and Minerva Rodgers still own the house today, and have included son John Rodgers II, who commanded ironclads in the US Civil War, Rear Admiral John Augustus Rodgers and his son, naval aviator John Rodgers.
context_section_description: John Ireland bought the unimproved property above Havre de Grace in 1787 and began construction on the Sion Hill Seminary, intended as a boys' school. Ireland sold the property with the unfinished house in 1795 to Connecticut merchant Gideon Denison. Denison was apparently a real estate speculator, believing that Havre de Grace would expand significantly, and accumulated 1,820 acres (7.4 km²) around the house. Denison died in 1799, and his daughter Minerva inherited. After her marriage to John Rodgers at Sion Hill, the couple added the house's details. After Rodgers' retirement from active naval service in 1815 he returned to Sion Hill, continuing to advise on naval policy. Rodgers died in 1838.  Minerva survived until 1877, but gave Sion Hill and 1,800 acres (7.3 km²) of surrounding land to her oldest son, Robert Smith Rodgers (1809-1891). Robert Smith Rodgers, a civil engineer, enlisted in the U.S. Army as a private and rose to the rank of colonel during the American Civil War. In 1841 he married Sarah Perry, daughter of Commander Matthew C. Perry. The son of Robert S. and Sarah Perry Rodgers, Rear Admiral John Augustus Rodgers inherited the house and lived there until his death in 1933.
  Sion Hill was the sight of an early aviation record.  On September 16, 1911 ENS John Rodgers became the first man in America to visit his parents by airplane.  He landed in a field about 200 yards from the house where his father, Rear Admiral John Rodgers, his mother Elizabeth, and brother Robert greeted him.  His intention was to leave the next day for New York where his cousin Calbraith Perry Rodgers was to depart Sheepshead Bay for San Francisco at 3 pm that afternoon to compete for the $50,000 Hearst Prize.  
  The house then passed to Rodgers' widow, Elizabeth Chambers Rodgers, who in 1944 left the property to a descendant of the first John Rodgers, John Meigs, John Rodger's great-grandson and grandson of Montgomery C. Meigs, who had married Louisa Rodgers. John Meigs in turn left the property to Montgomery Meigs Green in 1946. His wife, Ann, gave it to their son Jonathan Green in 2004.
caption: Interior view of Sion Hill, Havre de Grace, MD
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