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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 Rockwell 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 Rockwell 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 northwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors and hospitals were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Rockwell City is located in Calhoun County and is the County Seat.

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 Calhoun County: Buena Vista, Carroll, Greene, Pocahontas, Sac & Webster.

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

  • Calhoun County     (The home county of Rockwell City)
  • Boone County
    • Boxholm
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Buena Vista County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Rockwell City, with the one closest to Rockwell City listed first.
    • Newell
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northwest)
      • Newell is located in Buena Vista County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Newell
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 859 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Newell <1>
    • Juniata
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Carroll County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Rockwell City, with the one closest to Rockwell City listed first.
    • Lanesboro
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
      • Lanesboro is located in Carroll County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lanesboro
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 108 people
    • Lidderdale
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the south)
    • Breda
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Glidden
      (23 miles [37 km] to the south)
    • Ralston
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
    • Carroll Community Estates
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Carroll
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Arcadia
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
      • Arcadia is located in Carroll County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Arcadia
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 531 people
    • Willey
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the south)
    • Roselle
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Greene County
  • Humboldt County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Rockwell City, with the one closest to Rockwell City listed first.
    • Pioneer
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Pioneer is located in Humboldt County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pioneer
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 22 people
    • Gilmore City
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Bradgate
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
      • Bradgate is located in Humboldt County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bradgate
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 84 people
    • Humboldt
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northeast)
    • Rutland
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northeast)
  • Pocahontas County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Rockwell City, with the one closest to Rockwell City listed first.
    • Palmer
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the north)
    • Fonda
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northwest)
    • Varina
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Pocahontas
      (23 miles [37 km] to the north)
    • Rolfe
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
    • Havelock
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
  • Sac County
  • Webster County

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

Cemeteries Near Rockwell City ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Rockwell 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 Rockwell City - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Roby Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the southeast)
  • Reformatory Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the east)
  • St. Francis Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the east)
  • Rosehill Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
  • Lake Creek Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the south)
  • Greenwood Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
  • Twin Lakes Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the northwest)
  • Logan Twp. Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the southeast)
  • Piper Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
  • Heuser - Leith Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northeast)
  • Crown Hill Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Memorial Park
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
  • Continue List   (145 more) ...
    • Garfield Cemetery
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the west)
    • Cedar Cemetery
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the east)
    • Hope Cemetery
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northeast)

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 Rockwell City had a population of 576 people in 1895 with a post office and railroad service. In 2020, Rockwell City had a population of 2,041 people.

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

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Rockwell 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 79 newspapers that have been published in the area around Rockwell City.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Rockwell City. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Rockwell City and those printed in the larger area surrounding Rockwell City.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<2> of Rockwell City.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we begin with 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 Rockwell 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>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 drawn from Point A (ie- Rockwell City) 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 Rockwell City, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.