The Cedar Lane property was owned by the Poindexter family as early as the 1780s, beginning with William Poindexter, and remained in the family for several generations. An example of a Federal-style dwelling, Cedar Lane is one of a relatively small number of intact early-19th-century frame dwellings that has survived to reflect the development of a modest plantation house in the area by one of New Kent County’s earliest European families. The form and architectural features of the dwelling embody the area’s Early National and Antebellum period architecture as well as the success of its agricultural economy for members of the upper-middle class before the Civil War. Cedar Lane began as a hall-parlor plan and was soon expanded by members of the Poindexter and Apperson families into a central two-story massing flanked by one-room wings with elements of Federal and Greek Revival styling.

Since the property’s listing in 2017, repairs and rehabilitation work at Cedar Lane have revealed new information about the construction of the primary dwelling. Additional documentation was approved in 2020 that updates and clarifies the construction and evolution of Cedar Lane from the second quarter of the 19th century through the early 20th century.
[NRHP Approved: 5/6/2020]