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Our Genealogy Helper

Introduction ...

So far, we found very little information about Fort Dade. The little that we've found leads us believe that the community is historic.<1>

We've added Fort Dade to our Gazetteer with the hope that we can develop more information. If you can help us with Fort Dade, please Contact Us.

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 Fort Dade (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 Fort Dade. 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 Fort Dade ...

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.

For example, a typical abbreviation for Fort Dade: Ft. Dade

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 southeast corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors and hospitals 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.

Although our information shows that the community of Fort Dade is historic, it would have been located within present day Hillsborough County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Hillsborough County: Hardee, Manatee, Pasco, Pinellas & Polk.

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

  • Hillsborough County     (The home county of Fort Dade)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fort Dade, with the one closest to Fort Dade listed first.
    • Sun City
      (18 miles [29 km] to the east)
    • Gulf City
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Manatee Harbor
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Ruskin
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Park Village
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Park Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Park Village
      • Park Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • Bayou Pass Village
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Bayou Pass Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bayou Pass Village
      • Bayou Pass Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • Port Tampa
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for Port Tampa. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<4>
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Port Tampa
      • Port Tampa is located in Hillsborough County
      • Google driving directions:
      • From your current location to Port Tampa
      • From Fort Dade to Port Tampa
    • Apollo Key Village
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Apollo Key Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Apollo Key Village
      • Apollo Key Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • Golf and Sea Village
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Golf and Sea Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Golf and Sea Village
      • Golf and Sea Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • Marina Village
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Marina Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Marina Village
      • Marina Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • McQueens Village ‑ Historic
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for McQueens Village have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for McQueens Village
      • McQueens Village is located in Hillsborough County
    • Apollo Beach
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Manatee County
  • Pinellas County
  • Sarasota County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Fort Dade, with the one closest to Fort Dade listed first.
    • North Sarasota
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for North Sarasota have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North Sarasota
      • North Sarasota is located in Sarasota County
    • Desoto Lakes
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Desoto Lakes have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Desoto Lakes
      • Desoto Lakes is located in Sarasota County
    • Kensington Park
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Kensington Park have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kensington Park
      • Kensington Park is located in Sarasota County
    • Sarasota
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
    • The Meadows
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for The Meadows have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for The Meadows
      • The Meadows is located in Sarasota County
    • Pinecraft
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
    • Southgate
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Southgate have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Southgate
      • Southgate is located in Sarasota County
    • Fruitville
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Ridge Wood Heights
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Ridge Wood Heights have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ridge Wood Heights
      • Ridge Wood Heights is located in Sarasota County
    • Siesta Key
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • South Sarasota
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for South Sarasota have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for South Sarasota
      • South Sarasota is located in Sarasota County
    • Sarasota Springs
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Sarasota Springs have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sarasota Springs
      • Sarasota Springs is located in Sarasota County

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

Cemeteries Near Fort Dade ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Fort Dade.

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 Fort Dade covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.

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

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.

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

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

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

Newspapers Published in Fort Dade ...

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 46 newspapers that have been published in the area around Fort Dade.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Fort Dade, there are papers which were published within 21 miles [33.8 km]<6>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Fort Dade.

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 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 Fort Dade:

The official website for Hillsborough County: www.hillsboroughcounty.org/

The official website for State of Florida: https://www.myflorida.com/

Footnotes ...

<1>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 Fort Dade, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<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>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.
<5>If we found a location and have questions about the accuracy of our information, we will simply say that the marker is 'in the vicinity'. We are not confident about the location and the position of our marker is only a rough guide. If we have too many doubts about the location, we will not include it in our database.
<6>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Fort Dade) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Fort Dade. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 27.5903, Longitude: -82.7618    
<7>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.




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 28 Mar 2025