RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Iowa >> Black Hawk County >> La Porte City >> Genealogy HelperIndex...

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 La Porte City (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 La Porte City. 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 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.

La Porte City is located in Black Hawk County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Black Hawk County: Benton, Bremer, Buchanan, Butler, Fayette, Grundy & Tama.

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

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

Cemeteries Near La Porte City ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of La Porte City.

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 La Porte City - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Westview Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the east)
  • Pleasant Hill Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Anton Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northwest)
  • Engledow Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Fairview Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the south)
  • Mt. Auburn Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Spring Creek Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northeast)
  • St. Marys Catholic Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
  • Hill Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Pratt Creek Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Greenwall Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Zion Lutheran Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northeast)
  • Continue List   (258 more) ...
    • St. Marys of Mt. Carmel Cemetery
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
    • St. Mary's Cemetery
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
    • Geneseo Cemetery
      (8 miles [12.9 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>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that La Porte City had a population of 1,052 people in 1895 with a post office and railroad service. In 2020, La Porte City had a population of 2,230 people.

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

  • Mount Auburn
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Mount Auburn is located in Benton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mount Auburn
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 144 people
  • Jubilee
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Jubilee is located in Black Hawk County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Jubilee
  • Mooreville ‑ Historic
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southwest)
    • Mooreville is located in Tama County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mooreville
  • Washburn
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Gilbertville
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
    • Gilbertville is located in Black Hawk County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gilbertville
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 725 people
  • Shady Grove
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
  • Eagle Center
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
  • Brandon
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the east)
  • Raymond
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
  • Dysart
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Garrison
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
    • Garrison is located in Benton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Garrison
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 355 people
  • Jesup
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northeast)
    • Jesup is located in Black Hawk County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Jesup
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 2,711 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Jesup <1>
  • Continue List   (14 more) ...

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of La Porte City ...

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 148 newspapers that have been published in the area around La Porte City.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of La Porte City. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of La Porte City and those printed in the larger area surrounding La Porte City.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<3> of La Porte City.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we like to start with 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 La Porte City:

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 La Porte City, 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 obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- La Porte City) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.