Rockville Garage, 1916. The early automobile garage at the intersection of Rockville Pike and Veirs Mill Road, where Lewis Reed and his partners were building the business that would soon become Reed Brothers Dodge.

111 Years Ago This Month, Reed Brothers Dodge Began Its Remarkable Journey

In October 1915, automobiles were still something of a novelty on the roads of Montgomery County. Horses and wagons remained common, many rural roads were unpaved, and owning a motorcar was far from an everyday experience. Yet the automobile was beginning to change how Americans traveled, worked, and connected with the world beyond their own communities.

It was against this backdrop, 111 years ago this month, that the story of Reed Brothers Dodge began.

Only a few months earlier, in July 1915, Lewis Reed had entered the automobile business with Roy and Griffith Warfield in a newly established enterprise known as Rockville Garage. The business operated at the busy intersection of Rockville Pike and Veirs Mill Road, an important crossroads at the edge of Rockville.

The location already had a brief connection to the automobile trade. In 1914, Lee Ricketts and his sons had operated an Overland automobile agency there, one of the earliest automobile sales operations in the area. Lewis Reed was not involved with the Overland agency, but the activity at the site reflected just how quickly the automobile was beginning to find a place in everyday life.

A New Automobile Company Comes to Rockville

The decisive moment came in October 1915, when Rockville Garage secured a franchise to sell Dodge Brothers Motor Cars.

The timing was remarkable.

John and Horace Dodge had introduced their first automobile only the year before, in late 1914. The brothers were already highly respected within the automobile industry, having supplied engines, transmissions, and other components to some of Detroit’s leading manufacturers before placing the Dodge name on a car of their own.

Their new automobile quickly earned a reputation for sturdy construction and reliability.

Far from Detroit, in the small county seat of Rockville, Lewis Reed and his partners recognized an opportunity.

The arrival of the Dodge Brothers franchise gave Rockville Garage an automobile line that would ultimately define the business for nearly a century.

At the time, no one could have known what that decision would become.

There was no sprawling dealership, no large showroom filled with rows of new cars, and certainly no modern service department. Early automobile dealers were often mechanics, salesmen, gasoline merchants, tire repairmen, and problem-solvers all at once. Keeping the early motorist on the road could be as important as selling the automobile itself.

Rockville Garage grew out of that pioneering era.

Original Owners of Rockville Garage, 1915. Lewis Reed with Roy and Griffith Warfield, the original partners in the Rockville automobile business that would become Reed Brothers Dodge.

Building a Business in the Early Automobile Age

Lewis Reed was a skilled mechanic as well as a businessman, an important combination when automobiles still required frequent adjustments and repairs. During the early years, the garage represented several makes in addition to Dodge, a common practice among automobile dealers of the period.

But Dodge gradually became the name most closely associated with the business.

The garage also sold gasoline, tires, accessories, and even farm equipment. Automobile dealerships of the 1910s were rarely limited to the sale of passenger cars. They served a community that was only beginning to discover what motorized transportation could accomplish.

The automobile was changing Montgomery County one road and one family at a time.

Farmers could travel farther to market. Doctors could reach patients more quickly. Businesses could move goods over greater distances. Families could visit relatives and neighboring towns without relying entirely on railroads or horse-drawn transportation.

Rockville Garage became part of that transformation.

From Rockville Garage to Reed Brothers Dodge

In 1916, Lewis Reed purchased a one-third interest in the business. Three years later, in 1919, he bought out the Warfield brothers.

That August, Lewis’s brother Edgar Reed joined him as a partner.

The business then took the name by which generations of Montgomery County residents would come to know it:

Reed Brothers Dodge.

Although the Reed Brothers name arrived in 1919, the foundation had already been laid four years earlier. The Dodge franchise obtained in October 1915 established the relationship with the automobile manufacturer that would endure through extraordinary changes in both the company and the community surrounding it.

The dealership survived the Great Depression, automobile shortages during World War II, changing highways, suburban growth, dealership relocations, corporate changes within Chrysler, and dramatic changes in the automobile itself.

Through it all, the Reed family remained connected to the business.

Three generations would ultimately guide the dealership.

An October Decision That Lasted Nearly a Century

What began at a modest roadside garage in 1915 eventually became one of Maryland’s oldest Dodge dealerships under continuous family ownership.

Reed Brothers Dodge in its later years on Frederick Road. From the modest Rockville Garage of 1915 to a modern automobile dealership, the family business grew and changed with Rockville while remaining under continuous Reed family ownership until its closing in 2012.

Reed Brothers Dodge remained in business until May 1, 2012, nearly ninety-seven years after Rockville Garage first began selling Dodge Brothers automobiles.

By then, the world surrounding the dealership bore little resemblance to the one Lewis Reed had known in October 1915.

The dirt and gravel roads had become highways. Rockville had grown from a small county seat into a major suburban community. The simple open touring cars of the early automobile age had evolved into vehicles filled with technology that the first motorists could scarcely have imagined.

Yet the thread connecting those two eras remained remarkably intact.

It began with a small garage, an emerging automobile company from Detroit, and a young businessman willing to place his future in a machine that was changing America.

One hundred eleven years ago this month, in October 1915, Rockville Garage became a Dodge Brothers dealer.

That moment marked the beginning of a relationship that would span nearly a century and become the foundation of Reed Brothers Dodge.

What may have seemed at the time like a promising new business opportunity became something much larger: a family legacy, a Rockville institution, and an enduring chapter in Montgomery County’s automotive history.