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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 Lyons (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 Lyons. 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 northeast 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 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.

Lyons is located in Toombs County and is the County Seat.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Toombs County: Appling, Candler, Emanuel, Jeff Davis, Montgomery, Tattnall & Treutlen.

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

  • Toombs County     (The home county of Lyons)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Santa Claus
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the south)
      • Santa Claus is located in Toombs County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Santa Claus
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 160 people
    • Vidalia
      (5 miles [8 km] to the west)
    • Ohoopee
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
    • Charles
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
      • Charles is located in Toombs County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Charles
    • Toombs Central
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the south)
      • Toombs Central is located in Toombs County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Toombs Central
      • Estimated population in 2019: 486 people
    • Rock Springs
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southwest)
    • Cedar Crossing
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the south)
  • Appling County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Graham
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the south)
      • Graham is located in Appling County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Graham
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 289 people
    • Baxley
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
  • Bulloch County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • New Hope
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
    • Register
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Candler County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Canoe
      (18 miles [29 km] to the northeast)
      • Canoe is located in Candler County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Canoe
      • Estimated population in 2019: 785 people
    • Metter
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Pulaski
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Emanuel County
  • Evans County
  • Jeff Davis County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Tallahassee
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southwest)
      • Tallahassee is located in Jeff Davis County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tallahassee
      • Estimated population in 2019: 3,185 people
    • Hazlehurst
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the southwest)
    • Lumber City Ferry
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the southwest)
      • Lumber City Ferry is located in Jeff Davis County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lumber City Ferry
      • Estimated population in 2019: 1,257 people
  • Johnson County
  • Laurens County
    • Rockledge
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northwest)
  • Montgomery County
  • Tattnall County
  • Telfair County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Lumber City
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the southwest)
    • Scotland
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the west)
  • Treutlen County
  • Wheeler County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons listed first.
    • Ochwalkee
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
      • Ochwalkee is located in Wheeler County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ochwalkee
      • Estimated population in 2019: 3,732 people
    • Glenwood
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the west)
    • Alamo
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)

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

Cemeteries Near Lyons ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Lyons.

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

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

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Lyons, with the one closest to Lyons 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.<4>

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

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

  • Vidalia
    (5 miles [8 km] to the west)
  • Higgston
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
    • Higgston is located in Montgomery County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Higgston
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 305 people
  • McGregor
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
    • McGregor is located in Montgomery County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for McGregor
  • Collins
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the east)
  • Kibbee
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Kibbee is located in Montgomery County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kibbee
  • Reidsville
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Ailey
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • English Eddy
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • English Eddy is located in Toombs County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for English Eddy
  • Mount Vernon
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the west)
  • Altamaha
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the south)
    • Altamaha is located in Tattnall County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Altamaha
    • Former name for Altamaha:
    • Atamaha
  • Manassas
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the east)
  • Stillmore
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the north)
  • Continue List   (16 more) ...
    • Nunez
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
    • Covena
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the north)
      • Covena is located in Emanuel County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Covena
    • Tison
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
      • Tison is located in Tattnall County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tison

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Lyons ...

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 32 newspapers that have been published in the area around Lyons.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Lyons. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Lyons and those printed in the larger area surrounding Lyons.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 29 miles [46.7 km]<2> of Lyons.

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 helpful 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 Lyons:

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