Annapolis holds a capitol where you can trace the Revolution's end. This is the oldest U.S. state capitol in continuous legislative use, a building that dates to 1772 and still houses the Maryland General Assembly along with the offices of the governor and lieutenant governor. For a brief, pivotal moment in 1783 and 1784 it served as the capitol of the United States Congress of the Confederation, and it is here that Ratification Day—the formal end of the American Revolutionary War—occurred.
You can sense layers of time: construction began in 1772 but was not completed until 1797 because of the Revolutionary War, and the current building is the third statehouse on this site. Look at the two-story brick Georgian structure that sits inside State Circle, a design from architect Joseph Horatio Anderson. Notice the small portico that juts from the center, topped by a pediment and flanked by two high arched windows framing the entrance. Above it all rises a remarkable wooden dome—the largest in the United States constructed without nails. Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1960 and placed under the State House Trust in 1969, notice the wooden dome above you, the largest of its kind in the country, raised without a single nail.