The first modern settlers of the community were Adam Francis Plummer and his wife Emily Saunders Arnold Plummer, who had been slaves of the powerful Calvert family on the Riversdale Plantation in present-day Riverdale Park. After the Civil War, Adam Plummer purchased ten acres of land for $1000, south of the plantation and sought out and recovered family members that had been sold during slavery to deep south plantations, thus establishing the settlement. A skilled horticulturalist, Plummer named the settlement Mt. Rose after his favorite plant and copious rose gardens. Notably, Adam Plummer kept a diary as a slave which today is the only known living slave diary and is a featured exhibit of the Smithsonian Institution's Anacostia Community Museum.