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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Arizona >> Yavapai County >> Hecla >> 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 Hecla (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 Hecla. 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.

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 northwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most hospitals and doctors were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Hecla is located in Yavapai 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 Yavapai County: Coconino, Gila, La Paz, Maricopa & Mohave.

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

  • Yavapai County     (The home county of Hecla)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Hecla, with the one closest to Hecla listed first.
    • Cherry
      (5 miles [8 km] to the northeast)
    • Dewey - Humboldt
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
      • Dewey - Humboldt is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dewey - Humboldt
      • Estimated population in 2015: 3,988 people
    • Dewey
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
    • Humboldt
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
    • Stoddard ‑ Historic
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the south)
      • Stoddard is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stoddard
    • McCabe ‑ Historic
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the west)
      • McCabe is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for McCabe
    • Poland Junction
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southwest)
      • Poland Junction is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Poland Junction
    • Mayer
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Prescott Valley
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Arcosanti
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
      • Arcosanti is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Arcosanti
    • Spring Valley
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
    • Clemenceau ‑ Historic
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
      • Clemenceau is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Clemenceau

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

Cemeteries Near Hecla ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Hecla.

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 Hecla - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Cherry Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the northeast)
  • Humboldt Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
  • Henderson Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
  • Heritage Memorial Park
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
  • McCabe Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for McCabe Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the McCabe Cemetery is located 2 miles [3.2 km]<3> to the west of Humboldt.
    • The McCabe Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Miner's Union Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2437019 <2>
  • Masse Ranch Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southwest)
  • Mayer Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mayer Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Mayer Cemetery is located outside and to the southwest of Mayer.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #1985663 <2>
  • Howells Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • Middle Verde Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Middle Verde Yavapai - Apache Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Jerome Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Jerome Cemetery
    • The Jerome Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Hogback Cemetery
    • Jerome / Hogback Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #1405783 <2>
  • Angeline Hoagland Gravesite
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • Continue List   (34 more) ...

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.<4>

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

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

  • Cherry
    (5 miles [8 km] to the northeast)
  • Stoddard ‑ Historic
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the south)
    • Stoddard is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stoddard
  • Mayer
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Verde
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Verde is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Verde
  • Jerome
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
  • Howells ‑ Historic
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Howells is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Howells
  • Walker
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Walker is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Walker
  • Big Bug ‑ Historic
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
    • Big Bug is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Big Bug
  • Camp Verde
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the east)
  • Cottonwood
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Cordes ‑ Historic
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Cordes is located in Yavapai County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cordes
  • Cornville
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
  • Continue List   (6 more) ...
    • Whipple
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
      • Whipple is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Whipple
    • Fort Whipple
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
      • Fort Whipple is located in Yavapai County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Whipple
    • Prescott
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)

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

Newspapers Published in Hecla ...

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 82 newspapers that have been published in the area around Hecla.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Hecla, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Hecla.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we first turn to 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 Hecla:

  • Genealogy information for nearby counties

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>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 from Point A (ie- Hecla) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<4>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 Hecla, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.