The Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church — basically German Methodists going back to colonial days —merged in 1968.
The original Methodist Church was founded in England during the Reformation as an offshoot of the Anglican Church. Methodist evangelists came to America in the 1600s, long before the American Revolution. During colonial days and until well after the Civil War, the American Episcopalian Church was the largest U.S. denomination, and Methodist was second.
Even as late as the 1970s, the Methodists had many institutions all across the country—hospitals, retirement and nursing homes, seminaries and universities. You could be in Methodist company virtually most of the time, similarly to Catholicism or Judaism, if you grew up in the mid-to-late 20th century.
In the late 60s the seminaries went leftist or merged with "progressive" denominations, and over the next few decades, they have pushed the congregations ever more to the left. As a result, UMC has lost millions of members and all their non-theological institutional holdings.
I left after five generations of family. Many stayed because their parents or spouses were buried next to "their" local Methodist church. Others, as in every institution, aren't paying attention and were never fully convicted of the gospel.