Existing comment:
The District of Columbia Boundary Stones
In 1790, Congress authorized the establishment of a territory 10 miles square on the Potomac River to be the Capital of the United States. It was President Washington's recommendation to use land on both sides of the river. Surveyor Andrew Ellicott, notified in 1791 to proceed with designating the Federal Boundary by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, hired astronomer Benjamin Banneker, a free black man. Together they established the location of 40 sandstone markers set at one mile intervals on land ceded by Maryland and Virginia for the Nation's Capital. Virginia reclaimed her lands in 1846. The stone in this park, set in 1792 at the time of the Maryland Boundary Survey, is Northwest Number 6. Establishing the location at six miles north of the West Corner Stone. The Boundary Stones are considered the first monuments erected by the United States. |