[4] Located in the countryside several miles to the northwest of colonial-era Philadelphia, Penn's house served as his refuge from an older cousin's city home, where he had been lodging, as well as from an anti-Penn political faction in town.

Joseph Bonaparte lived here as a retreat from his home in Society Hill, and after Penn died in 1834, the house was inherited in succession by three other family members—Penn's brother and then two nephews separately.

[4] At some time after the final Penn owner died in 1869, the city bought the property and leased it to the Zoological Society of Philadelphia in 1874.

[7] The zoo's staff along with the Philadelphia Museum of Art performed restoration work on the house in 1975–76 to prepare it for the Bicentennial celebration.

A preservation group called Friends of The Solitude was formed in 1991 which has researched the house's history and continues to perform additional restoration work.