RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of California >> Humboldt County >> Cooks Valley >> Genealogy HelperIndex...










Learn About
The Commemorative
Quarter for
California

The Commemorative Quarter for California





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 Cooks Valley (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 Cooks Valley. 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 Cooks Valley ...

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.

Although we can't give a definitive list, hopefully the following will give you a feel for the variations that might have occurred.

  • A typical abbreviation for Cooks Valley: Cooks Vly. (or less commonly used: Cooks Vally. or Cooks Vlly.)
  • While the name of this community is Cooks Valley, be aware that it's the common practice of mapmakers to remove the apostrophe from possessive names<1>. So Cooks Valley may originally have been Cook's Valley.

    Sometimes the trailing 's' might be dropped altogether, in which case Cooks Valley might be written as Cook Valley.

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 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.

Cooks Valley is primarily located in Humboldt County. A portion of Cooks Valley extends into Mendocino County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Humboldt County: Del Norte, Mendocino, Siskiyou & Trinity.

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

  • Humboldt County     (The home county of Cooks Valley)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cooks Valley, with the one closest to Cooks Valley listed first.
    • Garberville
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
    • Redway
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
    • Harris
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Harris
      • Harris is located in Humboldt County
    • Whitethorn
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
    • Briceland
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Briceland
      • Briceland is located in Humboldt County
    • Phillipsville
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
    • Ettersburg
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Ettersburg have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ettersburg
      • Ettersburg is located in Humboldt County
    • Alderpoint
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Shelter Cove
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Miranda
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the north)
    • Fort Seward
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Fort Seward have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Seward
      • Fort Seward is located in Humboldt County
    • Myers Flat
      (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
    • Blocksburg
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
  • Mendocino County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cooks Valley, with the one closest to Cooks Valley listed first.
    • Piercy
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the south)
    • Leggett
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the south)
    • Bell Springs ‑ Historic
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the east)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bell Springs
      • Bell Springs is located in Mendocino County
    • South Leggett
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for South Leggett
      • South Leggett is located in Mendocino County
    • Bowman Place
      (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bowman Place
      • Bowman Place is located in Mendocino County
    • Spyrock
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Spyrock have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Spyrock
      • Spyrock is located in Mendocino County
    • Branscomb
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
    • Westport
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
    • Laytonville
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Dos Rios
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Trinity County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cooks Valley, with the one closest to Cooks Valley listed first.
    • Zenia
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Ruth
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northeast)

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

Newspapers Published in Cooks Valley ...

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 12 newspapers that have been published in the area around Cooks Valley.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Cooks Valley, 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 Cooks Valley.

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 professional and volunteer 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 Cooks Valley:

Cemeteries Near Cooks Valley ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Cooks Valley.

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 Cooks Valley covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.

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

  • Lilley Grave Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the south)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Lilley Grave Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Lilley Grave Cemetery
  • Garberville Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
  • Harris Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
  • Jewett Valley Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Ettersburg Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Martin Ranch Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
  • William Barnwell Sr. Memorial Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
  • Bull Creek Cemetery
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
  • Laytonville Cemetery
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Laytonville Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Laytonville Cemetery
  • Roscoe Cemetery
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northwest)
  • Newport Cemetery
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Newport Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Newport Cemetery
  • Pine Grove Cemetery
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Pine Grove Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Pine Grove 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.<6>

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

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

  • Garberville
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
  • Kenny
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Kenny have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kenny
    • Kenny is located in Mendocino County
  • Harris
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Harris
    • Harris is located in Humboldt County
  • Briceland
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Briceland
    • Briceland is located in Humboldt County
  • Phillipsville
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
  • Cummings
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Cummings have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cummings
    • Cummings is located in Mendocino County
  • Rockport
    (18 miles [29 km] to the south)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Rockport have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rockport
    • Rockport is located in Mendocino County
  • Blocksburg
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
  • Fruitland
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fruitland
    • Fruitland is located in Humboldt County
  • Westport
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
  • Laytonville
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Englewood
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the north)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Englewood have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Englewood
    • Englewood is located in Humboldt County

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

Unfortunately, we don't know of a website for Cooks Valley. If you can help, please contact us through our Feedback Page.

The official website for Humboldt County: www.co.humboldt.ca.us/

The official website for State of California: https://www.ca.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>It's generally believed that possessive apostrophes are removed to prevent confusion on maps where the apostrophe may be confused with a cartographic symbol. While this is generally true, it's not uncommon to find possessive apostrophes in administrative names (such as towns or counties).
<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>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 drawn from Point A (ie- Cooks Valley) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Cooks Valley. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 40.0013, Longitude: -123.7861       In this case, the coordinates for Cooks Valley have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>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.
<6>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 Cooks Valley, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.




 

Copyright 2024
All Rights Reserved

Thank you for visiting our website.

In closing, please keep in mind that we can not guarantee the accuracy or timeliness of the information on this website, so use with care. We encourage you to double-check the information that is critical to you.

If you've found an error or have additional information that you would like to share, please don't hesitate to write: Click here to contact us.

This page was last modified/updated: 07 Apr 2024