Tom Clancy’s estate on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay in Huntingtown, Md., on land that was once a popular children’s summer camp, is on the market for $6.2 million.
Clancy, who died at age 66 in 2013, was a lifelong Maryland resident. The former insurance agent rose to fame through his best-selling spy novels, many of which were turned into movies with stars such as Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford. His first novel, “The Hunt for Red October,” won praise from President Ronald Reagan, propelling it to the top of the sales charts. For three decades, Clancy wrote one thriller after another. In addition to writing books, Clancy was a part-owner of the Baltimore Orioles.
Distinguished homes for sale in the D.C. region
The Washington Post's picks of distinguished homes on the D.C.-area market.
Clancy purchased the 537 acres along the cliffs near Plum Point in two transactions for a combined $1.45 million in the late 1980s, according to property records. The Clancy compound was once home to Camp Kaufmann, which served more than 20,000 Jewish children from Washington from 1952 to 1984.
Advertisement
“For three or four weeks each summer, we, the children of steamfitters and secretaries, waiters and housewives, tailors and clerks, went to Kaufmann Camp for Washington Boys and Girls on scholarship — though there were richer children, too — along with Protestant and Catholic kids — to enhance diversity,” Anne Groer wrote in a 1985 piece for The Washington Post’s Outlook section.
Clancy turned the summer camp into a retreat that was said to resemble the fictional estate belonging to Jack Ryan, one of the characters in his books. Called Peregrine Cliff, it has an underground gun range, tennis courts, a basketball court, an indoor pool with a retractable roof, a two-story entertainment pavilion, a three-bedroom guesthouse and one mile of waterfront.
As Peter Carlson wrote in a 1993 Post magazine article about Clancy, “Clancyland [is] a world that reflected its owner’s personality as perfectly as the old Playboy Mansion reflected Hugh Hefner’s. The difference was that Hefner’s mansion, with its big beds and its bunnies, fulfilled the fantasies of a post-pubescent male. Clancyland, with its games and gadgets and guns, fulfilled the fantasies of a pre-pubescent male.”
Advertisement
Built in 1989, the main house was tucked down a long driveway behind a gated entrance and surrounded by acres of woods. The seven-bedroom, eight-bathroom, 17,178-square-foot house has multiple living and entertaining areas, a security office, a spacious kitchen, several decks, and an elevator. Clancy’s office has a wood ceiling, walls of bookshelves, views of the water and a built-in petrified-wood writing desk. In addition to the attached four-car garage, there is a detached four-car garage with a staff apartment on the second level.
The estate consists of 11 deeded lots, which may be subdivided.
Listing: 5000 Camp Kaufmann Rd., Huntingtown, Md.
Listing agent: Angel Stevens, Cummings & Co. Realtors
Previous House of the Week
More Real Estate:
Mortgage rates tumble to lows not seen in more than a month
Inside Serena Williams’s Bel Air, Calif., mansion
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7uK3SoaCnn6Sku7G70q1lnKedZK%2B2v8innKyrX2d9coSOamhoamNkwbC5jJyjmqaTrsBusdKtmK2dXZi1pr%2FAqZyao5Vir6LFjJqqpKtdoratuMiopWg%3D