1799
Museum building is constructed as a carriage house for twenty-three acre
Mt. Vernon estate

Carriage House

1826
Main estate house burns down. Joseph Hart purchases carriage house
and converts it into the Mount Vernon Hotel

1833
Jeremiah Towle purchases building and uses it
as his family home for over seventy years

1905
Standard Gas Light Company purchases property and erects gas tanks

1919
Jane Teller, President of the Society of American Antiquarians,
leases house and opens antique shop
 

Jane Teller

1924
The CDA purchases house to use as its headquarters

Insignia of The Colonial Dames of America

1939
 The CDA opens historic house museum to public as the
Abigail Adams Smith House 

Abigail Adams Smith

1988
The CDA votes to reinterpret museum as the 1826-33
Mount Vernon Hotel