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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
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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 Columbus (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 Columbus. 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 southwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Columbus is located in La Plata County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of La Plata County: Archuleta, Dolores, Hinsdale, Montezuma, San Juan & San Juan (NM).

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

  • La Plata County     (The home county of Columbus)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Columbus, with the one closest to Columbus listed first.
    • Vallecito
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the northeast)
    • Bayfield
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the south)
    • Gem Village
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the south)
      • Gem Village is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gem Village
    • Florida
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southwest)
      • Florida is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Florida
    • Hermosa
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Hermosa is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hermosa
    • Rockwood
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Rockwood is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rockwood
    • Ignacio
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
    • Carbon Junction
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
      • Carbon Junction is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Carbon Junction
    • Durango
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
    • La Boca
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
      • La Boca is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for La Boca
    • Allison
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
      • Allison is located in La Plata County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Allison
    • Hesperus
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
  • Archuleta County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Columbus, with the one closest to Columbus listed first.
    • Chimney Rock
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Arboles
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
    • Gato
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
      • Gato is located in Archuleta County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gato
  • San Juan County
    • Graysill ‑ Historic
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Graysill is located in San Juan County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Graysill

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

Cemeteries Near Columbus ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Columbus.

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

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

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

  • Shreck Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northwest)
  • Bayfield Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the south)
  • Crestview Memorial Garden
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Animas Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
  • Hermosa Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Ouray Memorial Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
  • Green Mtn. Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • Greenmount Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Greenmount Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Greenmount Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the southwest of Durango.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #1013065 <2>
  • Allison Tiffany Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
  • Elco Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
  • La Boca Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
  • Tiffany Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
  • Continue List   (9 more) ...
    • Hesperus Cemetery
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
    • New Rosa Cemetery
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
    • Altura Cemetery
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)

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 Columbus in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Columbus.

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

  • Hermosa
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Hermosa is located in La Plata County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hermosa
  • Trimble
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
    • Trimble is located in La Plata County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Trimble
  • Durango
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • Ignacio
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
  • Rockwood
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
    • Rockwood is located in La Plata County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rockwood
  • Piedra
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Piedra is located in Archuleta County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Piedra
  • La Boca
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
    • La Boca is located in La Plata County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for La Boca
  • Arboles
    (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
  • Fort Lewis ‑ Historic
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
    • Fort Lewis is located in La Plata County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Lewis
  • Rosa ‑ Historic
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Rosa is located in Rio Arriba County (NM)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rosa

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

Newspapers Published in Columbus ...

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 52 newspapers that have been published in the area around Columbus.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Columbus, there are papers which were published within 24 miles [38.6 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Columbus.

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 Columbus:

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 obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Columbus) 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 Columbus, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.