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Preaching was begun by Bishop Francis Asbury on March 13,
1773, at a local home.Asbury's journal  records:
April 1803: My subject at the New Chapel, Georgetown Cross
Roads (Galena's old name), First Timothy, Fourth Chapter,
second verse.
The first church was a wood frame building erected in 1808.
In 1842 it was moved to one side and used by slaves and
the present brick structure was erected. The old church
was later sold and moved to Olivet Hill where it now stands.
In 1888 a Sunday School Chapel was erected on the parsonage
lot.This building remained the Sunday school facility until
it was torn down in the early 1860's.
To meet the growing need for more church facilities, the
present Education building was erected in 1958.This building
still houses the Church School program and the Fellowship
Hall for group activities.
Today Olivet is still an active and growing church concerned
with spreading the "Good News" in the community
and the world.The Church community maintains an active program
of education and spiritual growth throughout the year. Everyone
is welcome and invited to be a part of Christian family.
At the time it was decided to found St. Dennis' Parish,
the priest responsible for attending to the spiritual needs
of Catholics in the area was the Jesuit, Matthew T. Sanders,
rector since 1852 of the Old Bohemia Mission base established
in 1704-as St. Francis Xavier's at Warwick, Maryland.
Dennis J. McCauley was the lay founder of St. Dennis' Parish
and the one person chiefly responsible for the erection
of the original St. Dennis Church.
 Dennis
J. McCauley was born in County Donegal, Ireland, May 14,1814.
Coming to America as a young man, he first settled at Philadelphia
where he became a very successful businessman. In 1854,
at the age of forty, Dennis moved his family to Kent County,
Maryland, where he bought a large farm at Lambson's Station,
two miles from the town of Galena, which was then known
as Georgetown Crossroads. His interest in this area is said
to have stemmed from the trips he used to make to the Eastern
Shore to buy hay for his horses; and, if he was in the flour
business, also probably to buy grain to make the flour.
Once settled in Maryland, he soon became very successful
in his new life as a Kent County Farmer.
Typically, Dennis McCauley had been settled at Lambson's
Station only a short time when he obtained permission from
Baltimore Archbishop Kenrick to build a church on the farm.
Deeding an acre of his best land for this purpose to the
Archbishop on September 17, 1855, and ready at any time
to give more if needed, Dennis personally contributed a
large part of the $3000 total cost of the 50 by 35 feet
church, collected some funds from others, and made himself
responsible for seeing that the church was paid for. Some
time afterwards, a frame rectory was built next to the church,
and the rear of the acre plot was reserved for a parish
cemetery.
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