Dumbarton Oaks is situated on land that formerly was part of a 1702 land grant patented by Colonel Ninian Beall (1625-1717) as the Rock of Dumbarton. In 1801, William Hammond Dorsey (1764-1818) acquired twenty acres from a Beall decedent and built a house, which survives, in part, as the central core of the present Dumbarton Oaks. The property subsequently passed through a series of individuals, including Vice President John C. Calhoun (1782-1850) and Edward Magruder Linthicum (1797-1869), who greatly enlarged the house. The Blisses acquired the house and six acres of land on November 15, 1920. They would eventually increase the size of the property to approximately fifty-four acres.