Washington Grove is a town in Montgomery County, Maryland. The population was 555 at the 2010 United States Census. The Washington Grove Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.HistoryFoundingAround 1800 Methodists began the tradition of camp meetings, where a group of Methodists would gather in a forest clearing to worship. Benches were arranged in a circle or oval with an elevated preachers' stand in the middle. Tents surrounded the area along with carriages and wagons behind them. Services lasted well into the night. The camp meetings provided cultural and spiritual improvement to those who attended.In 1873 a committee from the Foundry Methodist Church, located at 14th and G streets NW in Washington, D.C., began a search for a permanent location to hold annual camp meetings. They wanted a location with sufficient space for thousands of attendees, a supply of clean water, and a shaded location to provide relief from the summer sun. They wanted the location to be less than a day's trip from Washington, D.C., and protection from the sale of liquor, because Methodists did not believe in drinking alcohol.In June 1873 John T. Mitchell, Richard Willett, F. Howard, W.R. Woodward, E.F. Simpson, Mr. Worthington, Thomas P. Morgan, B. Peyton Brown, and a few others purchased 267.5acres of land from the widow of farmer Nathan Cooke for $6,636.25. The land was given to the newly incorporated Washington Grove Meeting Association.
