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The Commemorative Quarter for Florida





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 Salem (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 Salem. 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 hospitals and 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.

Salem is located in Taylor 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 Taylor County: Dixie, Jefferson, Lafayette & Madison.

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

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

Cemeteries Near Salem ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Salem.

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

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

  • Salem Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Salem Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Salem Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Sealey Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Sealey Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Sealey Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Cooks Hammock Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Cooks Hammock Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Cooks Hammock Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Sandhill Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Sandhill Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Sandhill Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • New Hope Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the New Hope Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the New Hope Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Mingo Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Mingo Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Mingo Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Steinhatchee Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Steinhatchee Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Steinhatchee Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Folsom Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Folsom Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Folsom Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Carlton Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northwest)
  • Land Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Land Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Land Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Bethel Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Bethel Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Bethel Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Brown Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Brown Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Brown Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Continue List   (47 more) ...
    • Bethany Cemetery
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Bethany Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Bethany Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Mt. Olive Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the south)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Mt. Olive Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Mt. Olive Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Faulkner Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Faulkner Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Faulkner Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.

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>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that Salem had a population of 101 people in 1895 with a post office and no railroad service.

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

  • Mayo
    (18 miles [29 km] to the northeast)
  • Perry
    (18 miles [29 km] to the northwest)
  • Luraville
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Luraville have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Luraville
    • Luraville is located in Suwannee County
  • Branford
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the east)
  • Waylonzo
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Waylonzo have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Waylonzo
    • Waylonzo is located in Taylor County

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

Newspapers Published in Salem ...

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 14 newspapers that have been published in the area around Salem.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Salem, there are papers which were published within 29 miles [46.7 km]<5>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Salem.

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 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 Salem:

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

The official website for Taylor County: www.tcfl-libinfo.com/

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

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 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.
<3>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.
<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 Salem, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<5>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Salem) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Salem. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 29.8869, Longitude: -83.4131    









 

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This page was last modified/updated: 28 Mar 2025