Washington, MO

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A beautiful, historic river town with a distinctive German heritage located in the heart of Missouri Wine Country… Washington is just minutes off I-44 between St. Louis and Branson. Washington’s rich history includes such famous individuals as Daniel Boone and Lewis & Clark.

Some of the earliest settlers in the Washington area were literally followers of Daniel Boone, who had blazed a trail from the hills of Kentucky to the wilderness of east-central Missouri. The German populace for which Washington is known for began with the arrival of twelve Catholic families in the fall of 1833. This group and other later German immigrants were sometimes called “followers of Gottfried Duden,” who for two years lived at nearby Dutzow and wrote glowing reviews of the area for readers in his homeland. The lush, green, rolling hills and the river valley reminded Duden of the area from which he came.

A natural river landing, at what was to become the Washington site, made this an ideal place to begin a settlement. In the first three decades of the nineteenth century, the small community grew upon the gently sloping hillside on the south bank of the Missouri River.