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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 Ranier (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 Ranier. 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 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.

Ranier is located in Koochiching County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Koochiching County: Beltrami, Itasca, Lake of the Woods & Saint Louis.

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

  • Koochiching County     (The home county of Ranier)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Ranier, with the one closest to Ranier listed first.
    • South International Falls
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for South International Falls have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for South International Falls
      • South International Falls is located in Koochiching County
    • International Falls
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for International Falls have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for International Falls
      • International Falls is located in Koochiching County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 5,714 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for International Falls <2>
    • Island View
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the east)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Island View have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Island View
      • Island View is located in Koochiching County
    • Ericsburg
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the south)
    • Littlefork
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Littlefork have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Littlefork
      • Littlefork is located in Koochiching County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 582 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Littlefork <2>
    • Loman
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Loman have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Loman
      • Loman is located in Koochiching County
  • Saint Louis County
    • Kabetogama
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Kabetogama have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kabetogama
      • Kabetogama is located in Saint Louis County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Kabetogama <2>

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

Cemeteries Near Ranier ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Ranier.

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.

If you need information about a burial or interment, photos, transcripts, how to contact the cemetery or local authorities, please visit our selection of Genealogy Websites (see below).

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

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

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Ranier ...

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 9 newspapers that have been published in the area around Ranier.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Ranier. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Ranier and those printed in the larger area surrounding Ranier.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 17 miles [27.4 km]<4> of Ranier.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we like to start with 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 Ranier:

Unfortunately, we don't know of a website for Ranier. If you can help, please contact us through our Feedback Page.

The official website for Koochiching County: www.co.koochiching.mn.us/

The official website for State of Minnesota: https://mn.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>The location has been supplied by the Geographic Names Information System - which is maintained by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). While these values should be definitive, we found that accuracy can vary and you should double-check the location if accuracy is required.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<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>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- Ranier) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Ranier. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 48.6128, Longitude: -93.3486    









 

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In closing, please keep in mind that we can not guarantee the accuracy or timeliness of the information on this website, so use with care. We encourage you to double-check the information that is critical to you.

If you've found an error or have additional information that you would like to share, please don't hesitate to write: Click here to contact us.

This page was last modified/updated: 28 Apr 2025