Wheaton is a census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, situated north of Washington, D.C., and northwest of downtown Silver Spring. Wheaton takes its name from Frank Wheaton (1833–1903), a career officer in the United States Army and volunteer from Rhode Island in the Union Army who rose to the rank of major-general while serving before, during, and after the Civil War.
Wheaton had a population of 52,150 at the 2020 census. The United States Postal Service has assigned ZIP code 20902 to Wheaton, but the Wheaton Post Office is a part of the larger Silver Spring area. Downtown Wheaton is located around the triangle formed by Veirs Mill Road, University Boulevard, and Georgia Avenue.
History
Three roads
Wheaton developed from Leesborough (named in 1826), a small business district that grew near the junction of three major roads. The first of these is Brookeville Pike (also known as the Washington-Brookeville Pike and later as the Union Turnpike, now Georgia Avenue) a north–south toll thoroughfare running from Washington, D.C., to Brookeville and eventually to Baltimore.
The second road, Veirs Mill Road (named after a grist and sawmill built on Rock Creek by Samuel Clark Veirs in 1838), was one portion of a much longer thoroughfare running west to Rockville, Maryland, and thence towards the Potomac River and subsequently to Virginia via ferry crossings. This was also known as the "City Road" in Rockville, and around the time of the Civil War it was known also as the "New Cut Road."
The last of these roads was known as Old Bladensburg Road (now University Boulevard) which, as it does in present day, connected Georgetown, Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Kensington, Wheaton, Silver Spring, and Bladensburg.
Mitchell's Crossroads
The business district became known as Mitchell's Crossroads, after Robert T. Mitchell's tavern, which sat at the northeast corner of Union Turnpike and Old Bladensburg Road.
In 1864, Confederate General Jubal Early led troops through the area on their way to attack Washington, D.C. Union General Frank Wheaton and his division beat them back at the Battle of Fort Stevens. who in October 1869, renamed the post office in honor of his commanding officer, General Wheaton. For some modern information databases, such as official real estate records, Wheaton (along with several neighboring locales) is considered to be a sub-section of larger Silver Spring.