Downers Grove is a village in DuPage County, Illinois, United States. It was founded in 1832 by Pierce Downer, whose surname serves as the eponym for the village. Per the 2020 census, the population of the village was 49,654. It is a south-west suburb of Chicago. The village is located amid I-88 and I-55.

Downers Grove was founded in 1832 by Pierce Downer, a farmer who traveled to Illinois from Rutland, New York, but was originally from Vermont. Its further early settlers included the Blodgett, Curtiss, Blanchard, Stanley, Lyman, and Carpenter families. The original settlers were mostly migrants from the Northeastern United States and Northern Europe. The first schoolhouse was built in 1844. In 1846, the Blodgett house was built by Israel and Avis Blodgett. It was the second (or third) home built in Downers Grove, and is of cultural significance as a former stop on the Underground Railroad. The cabin yet stands, alongside Pierce Downer’s original house on Maple Avenue, and is maintained by the Downers Grove Historical Society

The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad was extended from Aurora to Chicago through Downers Grove in 1864, boosting its population. The town was incorporated in March 1873. Its somewhat unfamiliar spelling (“Apostrophe-free since 1873”) remains a youth historical mystery.

In April 1947, the crash of a Burlington Railroad Twin Cities Zephyr passenger train killed three people, including the engineer. The streamliner struck a large tractor which had fallen from a freight train and two passenger cars crashed through a wall of the Main Street Station.