Site Re-Interpretation Results in a NEW Guided Tour at Sotterley Plantation
Sotterley Plantation is pleased to announce the NEW Guided Tour “Discovering Sotterley” of the 1703 Plantation House, which will be ready for public viewing on Sunday, May 1st, first day of the 2011 tour season.
A team of people came together beginning in the summer of 2010 to collaborate on the creation of a new guided tour for Sotterley Plantation. The goal was to not only gain a consistent and strong tour that would better recount Sotterley’s 300 year history, but to ensure that the stories of all who lived and worked here, including those enslaved, were remembered and told. The end result produced a tour which offers far more than Sotterley’s original goal, however, and the new tour will stand out from other sites in its approach and the experience it offers to visitors.
The new guided tour will still examine the complex and rich three century history of Sotterley Plantation, but will now also look at the site and its people through the lens of the Colonial Revival movement. At the turn of the 20th century when there was a resurgence of patriotism in our nation, the site was purchased and painstakingly restored by Herbert and Louisa Satterlee. Their restoration efforts focused on portraying the ideals of our colonial past, yet in doing so both highlighted and masked different aspects of Sotterley’s history. The new tour will not only offer new glimpses and perspectives into this National Historic Landmark’s past, but will also showcase collections pieces not previously displayed, which help to tell Sotterley’s stories.
This tour was made possible when Sotterley was awarded an Institute of Museum and Library Services grant last summer due to the efforts of Board of Trustees member Merideth Taylor. The new tour was written by Ken Cohen, Professor of History at St. Mary’s College of Maryland, and this summer Professor Cohen will also help create a Plantation Tour of the grounds which will then be made into an audio tour for visitors. Finally, the grant will produce an audio version of the guided tour, a 10-minute video about Sotterley Plantation, and help place streaming videos on the website.
1703 Plantation House Guided Tour:
May 1 - October 31. Check in at Visitor Center. $10 for adults $8 for seniors $5 ages 6-12 5 and under free.
Tuesday - Saturday Tours at 10:30 & 11:30 am, 1, 2 and 3 pm. Sunday Tours at Noon, 1, 2 and 3 pm.
(Photo courtesy of Sara Fisher)
I'm impressed with the wonderful changes/preservation of the c. 1703 Sotterly Plantation. God Bless all those responsible for saving Sotterly from ruin. It's such a beautiful piece of early Tidewater History plantation life, in Southern Maryland, overlooking the Patuxdent River, in St Mary's County. I'm a descendant of Rebecca Plater and her husband, John Tayloe II. It pleases me to see old family homes kept alive for all to enjoy; descendants and all other. This is a piece of early colonial history, in our great country, and it should live on for all to appreciate and understand that period of history. Mary Colville Griffith, retired, living in Delray Beach, Florida.
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