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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 Port Leon (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 Port Leon. 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 Port Leon ...

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.

For example, a typical abbreviation for Port Leon: Prt. Leon

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 northeast 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 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 east 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.

Port Leon is located in Wakulla County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Wakulla County: Franklin, Jefferson, Leon & Liberty.

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

  • Wakulla County     (The home county of Port Leon)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Port Leon, with the one closest to Port Leon listed first.
    • Saint Marks
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northwest)
    • Wakulla Springs
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
    • Crawfordville
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the west)
    • Panacea
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
    • Sopchoppy
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • Curtis Mill
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southwest)
      • Curtis Mill is located in Wakulla County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Curtis Mill
  • Franklin County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Port Leon, with the one closest to Port Leon listed first.
    • Saint Teresa
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Lanark Village
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Gadsden County
    • Midway
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Jefferson County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Port Leon, with the one closest to Port Leon listed first.
    • Thomas City
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
      • Thomas City is located in Jefferson County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Thomas City
    • Wacissa
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Waukeenah
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Lloyd
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Lamont
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Leon County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Port Leon, with the one closest to Port Leon listed first.
    • Woodville
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
    • Tallahassee
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the north)
    • Capitola
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the north)
      • Capitola is located in Leon County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Capitola
    • Bradfordville
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
      • Bradfordville is located in Leon County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bradfordville

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

Cemeteries Near Port Leon ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Port Leon.

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 Port Leon - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Magnolia Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
  • Raher Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Walker Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
  • Mays Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
  • Richardson Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
  • Debra Nell Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
  • Stewart Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
  • Causseaux Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Smith Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
  • Harvey Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Duggar Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Council Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the west)
  • Continue List   (57 more) ...
    • Sutton Cemetery
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Raker Cemetery
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Pelt Cemetery
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)

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.<2>

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

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

  • Saint Marks
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northwest)
  • Newport
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
    • Newport is located in Wakulla County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Newport
  • Wakulla
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
    • Wakulla is located in Wakulla County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wakulla
  • Crawfordville
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the west)
  • Woodville
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
  • Sopchoppy
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Saint Teresa
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southwest)
  • Wacissa
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Curtis Mill
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southwest)
    • Curtis Mill is located in Wakulla County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Curtis Mill
  • Tallahassee
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the north)
  • Chaires
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the north)
    • Chaires is located in Leon County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Chaires
  • Waylonzo
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
    • Waylonzo is located in Taylor County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Waylonzo
  • Continue List   (8 more) ...
    • Waukeenah
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Lloyd
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Smith Creek
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
      • Smith Creek is located in Wakulla County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Smith Creek

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

Newspapers Published in Port Leon ...

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 62 newspapers that have been published in the area around Port Leon.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Port Leon, there are papers which were published within 21 miles [33.8 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Port Leon.

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 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 Port Leon:

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>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 Port Leon, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a '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- Port Leon) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.