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 Montezuma (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 Montezuma. 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 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.
Montezuma is located in Maricopa County.
To see how the shape of Arizona's counties 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 Montezuma. For each of these counties, we show a sample of those communities that are closest to Montezuma:
- Maricopa County (The home county of Montezuma)
- The following are listed by their distance from Montezuma, with the one closest to Montezuma listed first.
- Agua Caliente
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Agua Caliente
- Agua Caliente is located in Maricopa County
- Harqua ‑ Historic
(17 miles [27.4 km] to the northeast) - Theba
(22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Theba
- Theba is located in Maricopa County
- Gila Bend
(30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gila Bend
- Gila Bend is located in Maricopa County
- Population from the 2020 Census: 2,118 people
- Former name for Gila Bend:
- Gila
- Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Gila Bend <2>
- San Lucy Village
(30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)- Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for San Lucy Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for San Lucy Village
- San Lucy Village is located in Maricopa County
- Yuma County
- The following are listed by their distance from Montezuma, with the one closest to Montezuma listed first.
- Hyder ‑ Historic
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest) - Palomas
(18 miles [29 km] to the southwest) - Aztec
(21 miles [33.8 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Aztec
- Aztec is located in Yuma County
- Camp Horn ‑ Historic
(22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Camp Horn
- Camp Horn is located in Yuma County
- Dateland
(26 miles [41.8 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dateland
- Dateland is located in Yuma County
- Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Dateland <2>
- Kofa ‑ Historic
(28 miles [45.1 km] to the southwest)
For an expanded list of the communities that are closest to Montezuma, see our County-by-County Page for Montezuma.
Cemeteries Near Montezuma ...
Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Montezuma.
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.
If you need information about a burial or interment, photos, transcripts, how to contact the cemetery or local authorities, please visit our selection of Genealogy Websites (see below).
If not found below, our Cemetery List for Montezuma covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.
The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Montezuma, with the one closest to Montezuma listed first.
- Oatman Farmily Graves
(6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Oatman Farmily Graves
- Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for the Oatman Farmily Graves. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
- Fourr Cemetery
(6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Fourr Cemetery
- Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for the Fourr Cemetery. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
- Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #57013 <4>
- Agua Caliente Cemetery
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Agua Caliente Cemetery
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.<5>
The Rand McNally Atlas shows that in 1895, Montezuma had railroad service and no post office.
These communities are listed based on their distance from Montezuma, with the one closest to Montezuma listed first.
- Papago
(5 miles [8 km] to the east) - Agua Caliente
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Agua Caliente
- Agua Caliente is located in Maricopa County
- Sentinel
(15 miles [24.1 km] to the south) - Palomas
(18 miles [29 km] to the southwest) - Aztec
(21 miles [33.8 km] to the southwest)- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Aztec
- Aztec is located in Yuma County
We've also created an expanded list of communities that existed in the 1890's and were located in the area around Montezuma. See our List of 1890's Communities around Montezuma.
Newspapers Published in Montezuma ...
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 4 newspapers that have been published in the area around Montezuma.
Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Montezuma, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<6>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Montezuma.
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 Montezuma:
- Websites specific to Arizona
- Jump to Cyndi's List
- Jump to Family Search
- Jump to Genealogy Trails
- Website for the //www.azlibrary.gov/arm
- Pages specific to Maricopa County
- Jump to Cyndi's List
- Jump to Family Search
- Jump to Genealogy Trails
- Genealogy information for nearby counties
- Yuma County
- Jump to Cyndi's List
- Jump to Family Search
- Jump to Genealogy Trails
- Yuma County
- Cemetery Information and Directories for Arizona
- Cemetery Junction: Cemeteries of Arizona
- Cyndi's List
- Cemeteries of Arizona
- Cemeteries of Maricopa County
- FamilySearch.org: Cemeteries of Arizona
- Find-A-Grave: Home Page
- Interment.net
- Cemeteries of Arizona
- Cemeteries of Maricopa County
Off-the-Road Links ...
Unfortunately, we don't know of a website for Montezuma. If you can help, please contact us through our Feedback Page.
The official website for Maricopa County: www.maricopa.gov/
The official website for State of Arizona: https://az.gov/
Footnotes ...
| <1> | An 'estimated' location is one where we have been given GPS coordinates, but are unable to verify the accuracy of those coordinates. That said, we have some confidence that we have placed the marker near the actual location. A typical reason for being unable to verify a location is that it might be on private property or maybe historic and gone without an obvious trace. |
| <2> | While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program. |
| <3> | The location has been supplied by the Geographic Names Information System - which is maintained by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). While these values should be definitive, we found that accuracy can vary and you should double-check the location if accuracy is required. |
| <4> | 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. |
| <5> | 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 Montezuma, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy. |
| <6> | Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Montezuma) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Montezuma. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 33.0759, Longitude: -113.2230 In this case, the coordinates for Montezuma have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). |