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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
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Our Genealogy Helper

Introduction ...

We have a couple of goals for our Gazetteer:

  • That it be a tool which helps us with planning our trips.
  • We're trying to shape our Gazetteer as a tool to help us understand the community in which our ancestors lived, the community that was part of their daily lives.
  • On our trips, we try to visit those places where our ancestors left their footprints.

By learning about Red Oak (and the surrounding area) during the time that our ancestors lived, we hope to have a better understanding of both their community and its relationship to their lifes. We hope that this tool helps to give us an insight into their world.

As we add data and organize our Gazetteer to help with our family research, we will be adding to this our Genealogical Helper for Red Oak. While we don't have information that is specific to any given person or family, we intend to expand our understanding about where and how people lived.

Name Variations for Red Oak ...

When searching records, keep in mind that names and their spelling can change over time. Our sources include documents like maps, railroad schedules, Travel, Express and Shipping Guides. Many of these documents date from the 1800's and it's common to find spelling differences.

Another variation: Redoak.

You might be interested in other communities that are also named Red Oak. More information can be found on our Tidbits & Trivia Page for Red Oak.

If you have information about these names (such as the reason for the change, date of change, the origin of the name), please Contact Us.

Neighboring Counties ...

When searching for family records, we have frequently made the mistake of not checking the neighboring counties.

For example, we have great-grandparents who lived in the northeast corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors were in the next county to the east. Almost all of the nearby churches and cemeteries were in the county to the north.

So when searching for records, we had our best success by looking in neighboring counties instead of the county in which they lived:  their home county contained property and probate records; the county to the east contained birth and death records; the county to the north contained their burial records. If we hadn't included the neighboring counties, we would have missed many valuable sources of information.

If you're in a similar situation, we hope that the following information helps.

Red Oak is located in Covington County.

To see how the shape of Alabama's counties may have changed over time, we recommend the Atlas of Historical County Boundaries.

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Covington County: Butler, Coffee, Conecuh, Crenshaw, Escambia, Geneva, Okaloosa (FL) & Walton (FL).

Below are the counties that are near Red Oak. For each of these counties, we show a sample of those communities that are closest to Red Oak:

  • Covington County     (The home county of Red Oak)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.
    • Libertyville
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
      • Libertyville is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Libertyville
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 110 people
    • Carolina
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Carolina is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Carolina
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 294 people
    • Horn Hill
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
      • Horn Hill is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Horn Hill
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 227 people
    • Lockhart
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southeast)
      • Lockhart is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lockhart
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 497 people
    • Andalusia
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the north)
    • Sanford
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the north)
      • Sanford is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sanford
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 259 people
    • Onycha
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Falco
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Wing
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Florala
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
    • Babbie
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northeast)
      • Babbie is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Babbie
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 599 people
    • Beulah
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
      • Beulah is located in Covington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Beulah
  • Butler County
  • Coffee County
  • Conecuh County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.
    • Brooklyn
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northwest)
      • Brooklyn is located in Conecuh County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Brooklyn
    • Paul
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northwest)
    • Mount Union
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northwest)
    • Johnsonville
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Centerville
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Centerville is located in Conecuh County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Centerville
    • Old Town
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Old Town is located in Conecuh County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Old Town
  • Crenshaw County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.
    • Dozier
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the north)
    • Leon
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
  • Escambia County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.
    • Bradley
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
      • Bradley is located in Escambia County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bradley
    • Roberts
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the west)
      • Roberts is located in Escambia County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Roberts
  • Geneva County
  • Okaloosa County (FL)
  • Santa Rosa County (FL)
  • Walton County (FL)

For an expanded list of the communities that are closest to Red Oak, see our County-by-County Page for Red Oak.

Cemeteries Near Red Oak ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Red Oak.

This is a new section and is likely to have errors. If you find an error, such as a missing cemetery or we have the wrong name, please let us know. If you know of them, we would also appreciate learning about previous or alternate names.

Although we don't have the information ourselves, if you need information about a burial or interment, photos, transcripts, how to contact the cemetery or local authorities, please visit our list of websites on our Genealogy Helper Page for Red Oak - one of the links might be able to help.

If not found below, our Cemetery List for Red Oak covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.

Nearby Communities in 1895 ...

We've built the following list with information that came from an Atlas published by Rand McNally in 1895. The Atlas had details such as the population of the community (which appears to have come from the 1890 Census) and whether there was a post office and/or railroad service available. We also indicate if the community no longer exists and is now historic.<3>

While we didn't find Red Oak in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Red Oak.

These communities are listed based on their distance from Red Oak, with the one closest to Red Oak listed first.

  • Beda
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southwest)
    • Beda is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Beda
  • Green Bay
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the east)
    • Green Bay is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Green Bay
  • Andalusia
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the north)
  • Florala
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Rome
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
    • Rome is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rome
  • Fairfield
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Fairfield is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fairfield
  • Wiggins
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Wiggins is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wiggins
  • River Falls
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
  • Opine
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Opine is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Opine
  • Loango
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Loango is located in Covington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Loango
  • Gordon
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Gordon is located in Walton County (FL)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gordon
  • Red Level
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northwest)
  • Continue List   (14 more) ...

We've also created an expanded list of communities that existed in the 1890's and were located in the area around Red Oak. See our List of 1890's Communities around Red Oak.

Newspapers Published in Red Oak ...

An ongoing effort between the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) has resulted in the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).

To share their results, the partnership has created the Chronicling America website. The goal of this partnership is to assemble a database about the current and historic newspapers of the United States. This includes a growing collection of scanned images from selected papers. All of it available to the public on their website.

Using information that we've taken from the Chronicling America website, we've identified 60 newspapers that have been published in the area around Red Oak.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Red Oak, there are papers which were published within 28 miles [45.1 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Red Oak.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we first visit the websites from Cyndi's List, FamilySearch and Genealogy Trails. These helpful websites offer the information directly or else point to where you can find it. Their information is open to everyone.

To help you get started, the following links will take you to the pages that are relevant to Red Oak:

Footnotes ...

<1>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<2>The Find-a-Grave website is an excellent research tool with information about a cemetery's location and interments. They also offer a forum for their members which can provide additional help. More information about Find-a-Grave can be found on their website: findagrave.com.
<3>We use the term 'Historic' broadly and it generally means that the community no longer exists. However, it can also mean that the community might still exist, but was significantly larger or had a more 'official' existence in the past than it does now. Unfortunately our sources of data have proven to be unreliable. If you can provide us with more specific information about Red Oak, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<4>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Red Oak) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.