Our Genealogy Helper
Introduction ...
Although we found mention of Sumas during our research, we really don't have any information about it.<1> We believe that Sumas had a post office at one time. We have done a cursory search and haven't been able to find any evidence that the community still exists..
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 Sumas (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 Sumas. 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.
Cemeteries Near Sumas ...
Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Sumas.
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 Sumas covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.
The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Sumas, with the one closest to Sumas listed first.
- Yarrow Cemetery
(2 miles [3.2 km] to the northeast)
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Yarrow Cemetery
- The Yarrow Cemetery has also been known as:
- Yarrow Mennonite Cemetery
- Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2277959 <2>
- Musselwhite Cemetery
(6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Musselwhite Cemetery
- To give a relative sense of its location, the Musselwhite Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the east of Abbotsford.
- Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #1995927 <2>
- St. Peters Cemetery
(6 miles [9.7 km] to the south)
- Vedder View Gardens Cemetery
(6 miles [9.7 km] to the northeast)
- Hazelwood Cemetery
(7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
- MacLure Road Mennonite Cemetery
(7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the MacLure Road Mennonite Cemetery
- The MacLure Road Mennonite Cemetery has also been known as:
- Hazelwood / McClure Road Mennonite Cemetery
- McClure Road Mennonite Cemetery
- Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2215356 <2>
- Carman United Church Cemetery
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the east)
- St. Marys Cemetery
(8 miles [12.9 km] to the east)
- South Poplar Mennonite Cemetery
(9 miles [14.5 km] to the west)
- Hatzic Cemetery
(9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
- Kendall Cemetery
(12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Kendall Cemetery
- Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Kendall Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
- Chilliwack Cemetery
(12 miles [19.3 km] to the northeast)
- Continue List (30 more) ...
- Nooksack Cemetery
(13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
- Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Nooksack Cemetery
- Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Nooksack Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
- Mt. Lehman Cemetery
(13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
- Aberdeen Cemetery
(14 miles [22.5 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 Sumas. See our List of 1890's Communities around Sumas.
Newspapers Published in Sumas ...
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 Sumas.
Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Sumas, 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 Sumas.
Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...
When we do our genealogical research, we start with the websites from Cyndi's List, FamilySearch and Genealogy Trails. These websites either 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 Sumas:
- Websites specific to British Columbia
- Cemetery Information and Directories for British Columbia
Off-the-Road Links ...
The official website for Province of British Columbia: https://www.gov.bc.ca/
Footnotes ...
| <1> | If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer. For example, we might find a sentence like "He went north past Sumas and then turned east". While Sumas could be some kind of landmark, we think that it's more likely to be a community. We've added Sumas as a placeholder with the hope that we'll be able to add more information in the future.
Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Miller Creek to see Pete ... Miller Creek is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.
Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.
Also keep in mind that Sumas could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong . Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
Since confusion between is common, we searched and weren't able to find another British Columbia community named Sumas. |
| <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> | 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> | Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Sumas) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Sumas. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 49.0669, Longitude: -122.1166 |