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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 Bena (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 Bena. 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 northeast 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 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 east 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.

Bena is located in Cass County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Cass County: Aitkin, Beltrami, Crow Wing, Hubbard, Itasca, Morrison, Todd & Wadena.

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

  • Cass County     (The home county of Bena)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Bena, with the one closest to Bena listed first.
    • Ryan Village
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the west)
      • Ryan Village is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ryan Village
    • Federal Dam
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the south)
    • Boy River
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
      • Boy River is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Boy River
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 51 people
    • North Central Cass
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
      • North Central Cass is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North Central Cass
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 29 people
    • Cass Lake
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • Whipholt
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
      • Whipholt is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Whipholt
    • Remer
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
    • Longville
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
    • Ah-gwah-ching
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southwest)
      • Ah-gwah-ching is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ah-gwah-ching
    • Walker
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southwest)
    • Wabedo
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
      • Wabedo is located in Cass County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wabedo
  • Beltrami County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Bena, with the one closest to Bena listed first.
    • Pennington
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northwest)
    • Rosby
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
      • Rosby is located in Beltrami County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rosby
    • Lavinia
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Lavinia is located in Beltrami County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lavinia
    • Turtle River
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Turtle River is located in Beltrami County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Turtle River
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 80 people
  • Hubbard County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Bena, with the one closest to Bena listed first.
    • Benedict
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
      • Benedict is located in Hubbard County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Benedict
    • Laporte
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
  • Itasca County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Bena, with the one closest to Bena listed first.
    • Deer River
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the east)
    • Zemple
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the east)
      • Zemple is located in Itasca County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Zemple
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 90 people
    • Max
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
    • Squaw Lake
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the north)
    • Bowstring
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
      • Bowstring is located in Itasca County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bowstring
    • Spring Lake
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Talmoon
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Cohasset
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the east)
    • Dora Lake
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the north)
      • Dora Lake is located in Itasca County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dora Lake
    • Wirt
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
      • Wirt is located in Itasca County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wirt
    • Marcell
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northeast)

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

Cemeteries Near Bena ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Bena.

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

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

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

  • Rabbits Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the west)
  • Fairview Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the south)
  • White Cloud Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Arlington Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Tibbets Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the east)
  • Fairbanks Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
  • Island Zion Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
  • Mary Donald Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the east)
  • St. Joseph Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the east)
  • Gilfillan Church Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
  • Lindenwood - Independent Apostolic Lutheran Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the east)
  • Olivet Cemetery
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the east)
  • Continue List   (51 more) ...
    • South Round Lake Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the north)
    • John Brown Cutback Cemetery
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Inger Cemetery
      (18 miles [29 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.<2>

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

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

  • Deer River
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the east)
  • Cohasset
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the east)

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

Newspapers Published in Bena ...

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 23 newspapers that have been published in the area around Bena.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Bena, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Bena.

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 Bena:

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 Bena, 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' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Bena) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.