Discover Rising Sun

Rising Sun brings together historic buildings and events spanning several centuries, with Plumpton Park Zoo offering a wildlife attraction. When planning your trip, you can combine a range of interests: architecture, local history, and wildlife. Historical highlights include the Jeremiah Brown House and Brown Water Corn and Gristmill; a tavern, railroad, and theater add further historical context. The details range from a stone tavern dating to around 1720 and a mill from 1734 to the Rising Sun Theatre, which opened in 1947.

Dove Valley on the outskirts of town

Dove Valley Vineyard and Winery is a multigenerational family business with a 100-acre family farm on the outskirts of Rising Sun. The 100-acre figure refers to the size of the family farm; the location places it on the outskirts of town. The reference to multiple generations also describes the business’s family continuity. Together, the acreage, location, and family history offer different insights into this agricultural operation.

The Jeremiah Brown House and the mill

The Jeremiah Brown House is a two-story, three-bay stone building with a gabled roof. It was built in 1757 by Jeremiah Brown, Sr. The house is an architecturally significant, unrestored, and reliably dated remnant of the distinctive Pennsylvania Quaker building tradition brought to Maryland during the colonial period. “Three-bay” describes the façade’s division into three bays; “two-story” indicates its two floors. Together with the gabled roof, these terms convey the building’s form. The house is also historically significant as part of a building tradition that reached Maryland during the colonial period.

About 1,000 feet southeast of the Jeremiah Brown House are the stone foundations of Brown Water Corn and Gristmill, built in 1734. A reconstruction of the original mill was erected on these foundations. The comparison highlights two different kinds of architectural evidence: the house is described as a stone building, while the mill is represented by its foundations and a reconstruction built on them. The mill dates to 1734, making it 23 years older than the house, which was built in 1757; the two sites are about 1,000 feet apart, with the mill to the southeast.

Tavern, railroad, and theater

Around 1720, Henry Reynolds established a stone tavern on Nottingham Lot No. 17 that served as a stopping place for stagecoaches. The railroad reached Rising Sun in 1865. On Christmas Day, a passenger excursion train arrived at the Rising Sun Train Station. These details describe different historical milestones: a stagecoach stop, the arrival of the railroad, and, later, an excursion train.

The Rising Sun Theatre opened at 11 E. Main Street on December 10, 1947. A description from 2023 identifies the old Sun Theatre as a surviving building on Main Street, a few buildings east of the town hall. Rising Sun’s theater history thus includes both a precisely dated opening and a building whose survival was described in 2023.

White lions at Plumpton Park Zoo

Plumpton Park Zoo is one of fewer than 20 zoos in the United States that keep white lions. This figure places the distinction in a nationwide context. If white lions are of particular interest to you, you can consider the zoo as a potential focus of your Rising Sun trip.

More destinations

Discover more destinations: North East, Elkton.

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