RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Arizona >> Maricopa County >> Fountain View >> Genealogy HelperIndex...

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 Fountain View (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 Fountain View. 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 Fountain View ...

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.

For example, a typical abbreviation for Fountain View: Fountain Vw.

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

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 southeast corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors and hospitals were in the next county to the east. Almost all of the nearby churches and cemeteries were in the county to the south.

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 south 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.

Fountain View is located in Maricopa County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Maricopa County: Gila, La Paz, Pima, Pinal, Yavapai & Yuma.

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

  • Maricopa County     (The home county of Fountain View)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fountain View, with the one closest to Fountain View listed first.
    • Fountain Hills
      (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
    • Fort McDowell
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Fort McDowell is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort McDowell
    • Continental Village
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
      • Continental Village is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Continental Village
    • Rio Verde
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
    • Pinnacle Peak Village
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northwest)
      • Pinnacle Peak Village is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pinnacle Peak Village
    • Hohokam Village
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southwest)
      • Hohokam Village is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hohokam Village
    • Buckhorn
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
      • Buckhorn is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Buckhorn
    • Royal Palm Village
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
      • Royal Palm Village is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Royal Palm Village
    • Paradise Valley
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
    • Scottsdale
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
    • Oakhurst
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
      • Oakhurst is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Oakhurst
    • Paradise Village North II
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
    • Mesa
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
      • Mesa is located in Maricopa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mesa
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 528,159 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Mesa <1>
  • Gila County
  • Pinal County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fountain View, with the one closest to Fountain View listed first.
    • Goldfield ‑ Historic
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Goldfield is located in Pinal County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Goldfield
    • Youngberg
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Youngberg is located in Pinal County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Youngberg
    • Gold Canyon
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
    • Santan
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the south)
      • Santan is located in Pinal County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Santan

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

Cemeteries Near Fountain View ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Fountain View.

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 Fountain View - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Jim Hart Memorial Monument
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Paradise Memorial Gardens
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
  • Camelback Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Hansen Desert Hills Memorial Park
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
  • City of Mesa Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
  • Mesa City Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
  • Mountain View Memorial Gardens
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
  • Mt. Sinai Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mt. Sinai Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Mt. Sinai Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the northeast of Phoenix.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2233155 <2>
  • Green Acres Memorial Park
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
  • St. Francis Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Governor Hunt Tomb
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery is a very large cemetery that is located in Gilbert.
    • The Queen of Heaven Catholic Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Queen of Heaven Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #57094 <2>
  • Continue List   (25 more) ...
    • Cross Cut Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Cave Creek Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)

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 Fountain View in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Fountain View.

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

  • Lehi
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Lehi is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lehi
  • Mesa
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
    • Mesa is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mesa
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 528,159 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Mesa <1>
  • Tempe
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Tempe is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tempe
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 200,402 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Tempe <1>
  • Cave Creek
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northwest)
  • Phoenix
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Phoenix is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Phoenix
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 1,708,127 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Phoenix <1>
  • Kyrene
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Kyrene is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kyrene
  • Peoria
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the west)
    • Peoria is located in Maricopa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Peoria
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 179,872 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Peoria <1>

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

Newspapers Published in Fountain View ...

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 41 newspapers that have been published in the area around Fountain View.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Fountain View, there are papers which were published within 14 miles [22.5 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Fountain View.

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 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 Fountain View:

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 Fountain View, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<4>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or 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- Fountain View) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.