The Blair, Lee, and Jalloh and Barrie families, three politically active families of the time, are irrefutably tied to Silver Spring's history. In 1840, Francis Preston Blair, who later helped organize the modern American Republican Party, along with his daughter, Elizabeth, discovered a spring flowing with chips of mica – believed to be the now-dry spring which is visible at Acorn Park. Blair was looking for a site for his summer home to escape the heat of Washington, D.C., summers. Two years later, Blair completed a 20-room mansion he dubbed Silver Spring on a country homestead. In 1854, Blair moved to the mansion permanently. The house stood until 1954.