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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 Marathon (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 Marathon. 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 southwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Marathon is located in Buena Vista 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 Buena Vista County: Calhoun, Cherokee, Clay, Ida, O'Brien, Palo Alto, Pocahontas & Sac.

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

  • Buena Vista County     (The home county of Marathon)
  • Calhoun County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Pomeroy
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Jolley
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Lytton
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the south)
      • Lytton is located in Calhoun County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lytton
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 285 people
  • Cherokee County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Aurelia
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Larrabee
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Cherokee
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the west)
  • Clay County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Webb
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
    • Cornell
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
    • Gillett Grove
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the north)
    • Greenville
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Rossie
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Rossie is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rossie
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 67 people
    • Dickens
      (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
    • Peterson
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • Royal
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northwest)
    • Spencer
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Langdon
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the north)
    • Everly
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
      • Everly is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Everly
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 541 people
    • Fostoria
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
  • Dickinson County
    • Terril
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
  • Humboldt County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Bradgate
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)
      • Bradgate is located in Humboldt County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bradgate
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 84 people
    • Gilmore City
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the east)
    • Ottosen
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)
      • Ottosen is located in Humboldt County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ottosen
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 36 people
  • O'Brien County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Moneta
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Moneta is located in O'Brien County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Moneta
    • Sutherland
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
    • Calumet
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the west)
      • Calumet is located in O'Brien County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Calumet
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 155 people
  • Palo Alto County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Marathon, with the one closest to Marathon listed first.
    • Ayrshire
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Curlew
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Mallard
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the east)
    • Ruthven
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the north)
    • Emmetsburg
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
    • Rodman
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Cylinder
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Cylinder is located in Palo Alto County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cylinder
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 84 people
    • West Bend
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the east)
    • Graettinger
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Pocahontas County
  • Sac County

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

Cemeteries Near Marathon ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Marathon.

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

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

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

  • Poland Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the west)
  • Smith Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the south)
  • Garton Graveyard
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Swan Lake Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the east)
  • Fairfield Twp. Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the south)
  • Garfield Twp. Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
  • Osborn Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Sacred Heart Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the east)
  • Laurens Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the east)
  • Burr Oak Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
  • St. Josephs Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
  • Marshall Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southeast)
  • Continue List   (129 more) ...

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.<3>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that in 1895, Marathon had a post office and railroad service. In 2020, Marathon had a population of 228 people.

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

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

Newspapers Published in Marathon ...

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 130 newspapers that have been published in the area around Marathon.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Marathon, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Marathon.

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 Marathon:

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 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.
<3>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 Marathon, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<4>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Marathon) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.