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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
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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 Dafter (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 Dafter. 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 hospitals and 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.

Dafter is located in Chippewa County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Chippewa County: Luce & Mackinac.

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

  • Chippewa County     (The home county of Dafter)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Dafter, with the one closest to Dafter listed first.
    • Brimley
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Kinross
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southwest)
    • Barbeau
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southeast)
    • Gardenville
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northeast)
      • Gardenville is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gardenville
    • Bay Mills
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Bay Mills is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bay Mills
    • Sault Sainte Marie
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
    • Oak Ridge
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
      • Oak Ridge is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Oak Ridge
    • Stirlingville
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
      • Stirlingville is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stirlingville
    • Rudyard
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southwest)
    • Pickford
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
    • Dryburg
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the southwest)
      • Dryburg is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dryburg
    • Fibre
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
      • Fibre is located in Chippewa County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fibre
  • Mackinac County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Dafter, with the one closest to Dafter listed first.
    • Simmons ‑ Historic
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
      • Simmons is located in Mackinac County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Simmons
    • Hessel
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
    • Pontchartrain Shores
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
      • Pontchartrain Shores is located in Mackinac County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pontchartrain Shores
    • Cedarville
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
    • Port Dolomite
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the south)
      • Port Dolomite is located in Mackinac County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Port Dolomite
    • Ozark
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
      • Ozark is located in Mackinac County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ozark
    • Kenneth
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southwest)
      • Kenneth is located in Mackinac County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kenneth

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

Cemeteries Near Dafter ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Dafter.

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

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

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

  • Dafter Twp. Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
  • Cottage Park Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northwest)
  • Donaldson Presbyterian Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Pine Grove Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the northeast)
  • Donaldson Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the southeast)
  • Oaklawn Chapel Gardens
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Rosedale Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
  • Lake View Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Bayview Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Barbeau Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southeast)
  • Rudyard Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southwest)
  • St. Marys Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Continue List   (57 more) ...
    • Maple Ridge Cemetery
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the north)
    • Bethel Cemetery
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the south)
    • Wilwalk Cemetery
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the east)

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>

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

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

  • Donaldson
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Donaldson is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Donaldson
  • Rosedale
    (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
    • Rosedale is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rosedale
  • Kinross
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Barbeau
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southeast)
  • Bay Mills
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the northwest)
    • Bay Mills is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bay Mills
  • Rudyard
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southwest)
  • Stirlingville
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the southeast)
    • Stirlingville is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stirlingville
  • Pickford
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
  • Stalwart
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Stalwart is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stalwart
  • Hessel
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
  • Cedarville
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
  • Raber
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Raber is located in Chippewa County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Raber
  • Eckerman
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
  • Ozark
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Ozark is located in Mackinac County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ozark

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

Newspapers Published in Dafter ...

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 19 newspapers that have been published in the area around Dafter.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Dafter, there are papers which were published within 14 miles [22.5 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Dafter.

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 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 Dafter:

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 Dafter, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<3>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 from Point A (ie- Dafter) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.