RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Illinois >> Iroquois County >> Ridgeville >> Tidbits & TriviaIndex...

Outdoor Activities ...

As we travel, we like to pursue some of our interests (such as astronomy and bird watching).

When in Ridgeville, we use the following websites to find information relevant to Ridgeville and the surrounding area.

  • Weather ...
  • Astronomy & Satellites ...
    • Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
    • To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above, we pass this GPS location for Ridgeville:
    • 40.713866, -88.068271
    • Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
    • Open the Heavens-Above website centered on Ridgeville
  • Bird Watching ...
    • We enjoy finding new spots for bird watching and we use the eBird website for local sighting reports and to help identify hotspots.
    • The eBird website is organized on a county-by-county basis. We have selected Iroquois County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Iroquois County
    • Since Ridgeville is near Ford County and also Livingston County, we have provided a link to their eBird sighting reports:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Ford County
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Livingston County
  • Waymarking ...
    • Looking for somewhere out of the ordinary? Find a unique place and want to share it with others? Then it's time to visit Waymarking.com:
    • Open the Waymark.com report for Ridgeville

Communities Also Named Ridgeville ...

We found seventeen communities that are also named Ridgeville.

Within Illinois, the name Ridgeville is unique.

Beyond Illinois, we know of seventeen communities that are located in the United States and Canada. Of these seventeen communities, fifteen are located in the United States and two are in Canada.

  • Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
    • Alabama
      • Butler County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Butler County and lies 610 miles [981.7 km]<1> to the south of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Butler County community of Ridgeville.
      • Etowah County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Etowah County and lies 472 miles [759.6 km] to the south southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Etowah County community of Ridgeville.
    • California
      • Trinity County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Trinity County and lies 1,803 miles [2,901.6 km]<1> to the west northwest of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Trinity County community of Ridgeville.
    • Georgia
      • McIntosh County
      • This Ridgeville is located in McIntosh County and lies 742 miles [1,194.1 km]<1> to the south southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the McIntosh County community of Ridgeville.
    • Indiana
      • Randolph County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Randolph County and lies 162 miles [260.7 km]<1> to the east of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Randolph County community of Ridgeville.
    • Manitoba
      • This Ridgeville lies 723 miles [1,163.6 km]<1> to the northwest of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
    • Maryland
      • Carroll County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Carroll County and lies 583 miles [938.2 km]<1> to the east of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Carroll County community of Ridgeville.
    • Michigan
      • Lenawee County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Lenawee County and lies 222 miles [357.3 km]<1> to the east northeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Lenawee County community of Ridgeville.
    • Mississippi
      • Tippah County
      • We found mention of this community, but have little information.<2> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Mississippi community of Ridgeville [Tippah County].
    • North Carolina
      • Caswell County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Caswell County and lies 568 miles [914.1 km]<1> to the east southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Caswell County community of Ridgeville.
    • Ohio
      • Warren County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Warren County and lies 221 miles [355.7 km]<1> to the east southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Warren County community of Ridgeville.
      • Wyandot County
      • This community is historic<3> and although located in Wyandot County, we don't know where within the county.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Wyandot County community of Ridgeville.
    • Ontario
      • This Ridgeville lies 477 miles [767.7 km]<1> to the east northeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
    • Pennsylvania
      • Montour County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Montour County and lies 600 miles [965.6 km]<1> to the east of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Montour County community of Ridgeville.
    • South Carolina
      • Dorchester County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Dorchester County and lies 677 miles [1,089.5 km]<1> to the southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Dorchester County community of Ridgeville.
    • Tennessee
      • Moore County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Moore County and lies 387 miles [622.8 km]<1> to the south southeast of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Moore County community of Ridgeville.
    • West Virginia
      • Mineral County
      • This Ridgeville is located in Mineral County and lies 488 miles [785.4 km]<1> to the east of the Ridgeville that is located in Iroquois County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Mineral County community of Ridgeville.

Curious and Interesting Names Near Ridgeville ...

As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.

  • Cereal
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
    • Cereal is located in Livingston County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cereal
  • Charlotte
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Clarence
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the south)
    • Clarence is located in Ford County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Clarence
  • Crescent City
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the east)
  • Goodwine
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Leonard
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
    • Leonard is located in Iroquois County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Leonard
  • Melvin
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
  • Piper City
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Pitchin
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southeast)
    • Pitchin is located in Iroquois County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pitchin
  • Risk
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
    • Risk is located in Livingston County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Risk
  • Wing
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Woodland Junction
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the east)
    • Woodland Junction is located in Iroquois County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Woodland Junction

How Far From Ridgeville to ...

We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers & Almanacs that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Ridgeville to various places of note, such as the White House.

With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance beginning in Ridgeville and extending to:

  • Watseka, which is the Seat of Iroquois County, lies 18 miles [29 km]<1> to the east northeast. If you could walk a straight line from Ridgeville to Watseka, with an average speed<5> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take just over a day to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take five to six hours.
  • Springfield, which is the State Capital of Illinois, lies 105 miles [169 km] to the southwest (SW). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take less than two hours, a buggy would take 5 days and walking would take 6 days.
  • The White House (Washington, DC) is 598 miles [962.4 km] to the east (E). Driving would take just over a day, a buggy would take 24 days and walking would take 34 days.
  • The shortest distance<6> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,255 miles [10,066.4 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<7>
  • The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,991 miles [11,250.9 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<8>
  • The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,873 miles [7,842.3 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<9>'

Footnotes ...

<1>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Ridgeville) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<2>If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer as a placeholder. As we find more information about that community, it will be added to our Gazetteer.

Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Rock Creek to see Pete ... Rock Creek is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.

Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.

Also keep in mind that Ridgeville could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong county. Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
<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 Ridgeville, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<4>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<5>While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<6>The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Ridgeville to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Ridgeville. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 40.7139, Longitude: -88.0683       In this case, the coordinates for Ridgeville have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<7>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 314.723 degrees.
<8>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 311.494 degrees.
<9>The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 309.109 degrees.