Jefferson Patterson Park & Museum is Maryland's state museum of archaeology, sitting on farmland called Point Farm along the Patuxent River. The park's own timeline records the depth of the place: human presence from about 7500 BC, oyster-processing pits around AD 1070, the Stearns village site with corn agriculture around 1460, and the Patuxent people's 1608 encounter with Captain John Smith sailing upriver. In 1814 the Battle of St. Leonard Creek, Maryland's largest naval engagement, was fought off its shores. Mary Marvin Patterson donated the property to Maryland in 1983 to establish the museum, which now runs the Maryland Archaeological Conservation Laboratory, a statewide conservation facility for archaeological collections, alongside trails, a reconstructed Indian village interpretive area, and colonial farm buildings.

The honest framing for a sacred-places library: this is an archaeology museum and heritage park, not a living pilgrimage destination, and its value is as protected ancestral landscape of the Patuxent people and their successors, presented through careful interpretation rather than ceremony. The park states plainly that people have lived in the area for over 12,000 years, and its Indian Village program interprets Woodland-period life on the river. Admission is free, the grounds and trails are open daily, and the visitor center and exhibits run on a seasonal schedule.

Visiting

Jefferson Patterson Park & Museum (Maryland Historical Trust) is at St. Leonard, Maryland: grounds and trails daily 7:30 am to dusk; visitor center Wednesday through Sunday 9:30 am to 4 pm on the seasonal schedule (April through November); the MAC Lab is closed for construction with reopening anticipated late 2026. No admission cost; some programs require registration.

Photo: [Acroterion, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Patuxent_River_at_Jefferson_Patterson_Park_MD1.jpg)

Associated traditions & practices

Native American Traditions