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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 Fair Oaks (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 Fair Oaks. 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 southeast 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 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.

Fair Oaks is located in Mendocino County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Mendocino County: Glenn, Humboldt, Lake, Sonoma, Tehama & Trinity.

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

  • Mendocino County     (The home county of Fair Oaks)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fair Oaks, with the one closest to Fair Oaks listed first.
    • Willits
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the north)
    • Soda Springs
      (5 miles [8 km] to the northwest)
      • Soda Springs is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Soda Springs
    • Shake City
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Shake City is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Shake City
    • Orrs Springs
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the south)
      • Orrs Springs is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Orrs Springs
    • Redwood Valley
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southeast)
    • Potter Valley
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the east)
    • Calpella
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
    • The Forks
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
      • The Forks is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for The Forks
    • Comptche
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the southwest)
    • Ukiah
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Ukiah is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ukiah
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 15,883 people
      • Ukiah has also been known as:
      • Ukiah City
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Ukiah <1>
    • Hemlock Ranch
      (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
      • Hemlock Ranch is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hemlock Ranch
      • Hemlock Ranch has also been known as:
      • Hemlock
    • Navarro
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
  • Lake County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fair Oaks, with the one closest to Fair Oaks listed first.
    • Witter Springs
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Witter Springs is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Witter Springs
    • Saratoga Springs
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
      • Saratoga Springs is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Saratoga Springs
    • Upper Lake
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Robinson Rancheria
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)
      • Robinson Rancheria is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Robinson Rancheria
    • North Lakeport
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
      • North Lakeport is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North Lakeport

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

Cemeteries Near Fair Oaks ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Fair Oaks.

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 Fair Oaks - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Little Lake Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
  • Willits Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northwest)
  • Potter Valley Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southeast)
  • Pinoleville Rancheria Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Ukiah Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Shields Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
  • Indian Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Laytonville Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the north)
  • Hulls Grave
    (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
  • Evergreen Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
  • Hillcrest Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
  • Little River Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
  • Continue List   (11 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.<3>

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

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

  • Willits
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the north)
  • Hearst
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Hearst is located in Mendocino County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hearst
  • Calpella
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Potter Valley
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the east)
  • Pomo
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
    • Pomo is located in Mendocino County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pomo
  • Comptche
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the southwest)
  • Ukiah
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Ukiah is located in Mendocino County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ukiah
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 15,883 people
    • Ukiah has also been known as:
    • Ukiah City
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Ukiah <1>
  • Hemlock Ranch
    (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
    • Hemlock Ranch is located in Mendocino County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hemlock Ranch
    • Hemlock Ranch has also been known as:
    • Hemlock
  • Navarro
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
  • Talmage
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
  • Philo
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
  • Laytonville
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the north)
  • Continue List   (13 more) ...
    • Mendocino
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
    • Inglenook
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northwest)
      • Inglenook is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Inglenook
    • Cleone
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
      • Cleone is located in Mendocino County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cleone

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

Newspapers Published in Fair Oaks ...

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 70 newspapers that have been published in the area around Fair Oaks.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Fair Oaks, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Fair Oaks.

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 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 Fair Oaks:

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 Fair Oaks, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<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- Fair Oaks) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.