Qualla: Georgetown (Washington, D.C.)

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Warren LeMay from Cincinnati, OH, United States, CC0. George Washington negotiated for the federal district from a tavern in Georgetown. Suter's Tavern stood near present-day Wisconsin Avenue and the canal, and Washington met repeatedly with the local landowners in its taproom in the spring of 1791 to assemble the land that would become the District of Columbia. The town the negotiations happened in was already forty years old at that point. Georgetown had been founded as a tobacco port in 1751 at the head of navigation on the Potomac, the farthest upstream that ocean-going vessels could reach. It was a working town when Washington bought it the land around it. It is now one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the country, with the highest-priced rowhouses outside Manhattan and the deepest history in the District. Most of the rowhouses Washington walked past on his way to Suter's Tavern are still there.

Image: Warren LeMay from Cincinnati, OH, United States | CC0

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Before the Federal City

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hu Totya, CC BY-SA 3.0. In 1632 the English fur trader Henry Fleet documented an Algonquian village called Tohoga on the bluffs above the Potomac, home to the Nacotchtank people who had traded along the river for generations. The Maryland legislature authorized the establishment of a town here in 1751 t...

Image: Hu Totya | CC BY-SA 3.0

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Absorbed by Washington

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Warren LeMay from Cincinnati, OH, United States, CC0. When the federal capital moved from Philadelphia to Washington in 1800, Georgetown became an independent municipality inside the new District of Columbia, one of three (along with Washington City and Alexandria). The town kept its own mayor, charter, and street names until 1871, ...

Image: Warren LeMay from Cincinnati, OH, United States | CC0

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Slavery, Free Communities, and the Mount Zion Church

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit APK, CC BY-SA 4.0. The 1800 census showed Georgetown with 5,120 people, of whom 1,449 were enslaved and 227 were free Black residents. Slave trading was active in the town: John Beattie ran a business on O Street starting in 1760, and other slave dealers operated near M Street and Wisconsin Avenue....

Image: APK | CC BY-SA 4.0

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Decline and Preservation

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit APK, CC BY-SA 4.0. The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, begun on July 4, 1828, was meant to revive Georgetown's port economy after the river silted up below the falls. The canal reached Cumberland in 1850, eight years after the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad got there, and was never profitable. Flour millin...

Image: APK | CC BY-SA 4.0

Georgetown (Washington, D.C.): Twenty-First Century Georgetown

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit E.B. Thompson, Public domain. Today Georgetown is one of the most expensive residential neighborhoods in the United States. The commercial core at M Street and Wisconsin Avenue holds high-end retail (the Georgetown Park mall has been redeveloped into a more boutique format), bars, and restaurants. The waterfr...

Image: E.B. Thompson | Public domain