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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 Hot Springs (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 Hot Springs. 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.

Name Variations for Hot Springs ...

When searching records, keep in mind that names and their spelling can change over time. Our sources include documents like maps, railroad schedules, Travel, Express and Shipping Guides. Many of these documents date from the 1800's and it's common to find spelling differences.

Although we can't give a definitive list, hopefully the following will give you a feel for the variations that might occur.

For example, a typical abbreviation for Hot Springs: Hot Spgs. (or less commonly used: Hot Spngs. or Hot Sprngs.)

You might be interested in other communities that are also named Hot Springs. More information can be found on our Tidbits & Trivia Page for Hot Springs.

If you have information about these names (such as the reason for the change, date of change, the origin of the name), please Contact Us.

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 southwest 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 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 west 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.

Hot Springs is located in Sanders County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Sanders County: Bonner (ID), Shoshone (ID), Flathead, Lake, Lincoln, Mineral & Missoula.

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

  • Sanders County     (The home county of Hot Springs)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Hot Springs, with the one closest to Hot Springs listed first.
    • Lonepine
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
    • Niarada
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the north)
      • Niarada is located in Sanders County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Niarada
    • Plains
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
    • Paradise
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Island City ‑ Historic
      (18 miles [29 km] to the south)
      • Island City is located in Sanders County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Island City
    • Eddy
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
      • Eddy is located in Sanders County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Eddy
    • Agency
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Agency is located in Sanders County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Agency
    • Dixon
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Old Agency
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Old Agency is located in Sanders County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Old Agency
  • Lake County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Hot Springs, with the one closest to Hot Springs listed first.
    • Big Arm
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Elmo
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Kerr
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Kerr is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kerr
    • Jette
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
      • Jette is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Jette
    • Rocky Point
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the east)
      • Rocky Point is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rocky Point
    • Polson
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
    • Dayton
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Proctor
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Moiese
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Kings Point
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Kings Point is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kings Point
    • Lake Mary Ronan
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Lake Mary Ronan is located in Lake County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lake Mary Ronan
    • Charlo
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Mineral County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Hot Springs, with the one closest to Hot Springs listed first.
    • Saint Regis
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Superior
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the south)
  • Missoula County
    • Old Town
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
      • Old Town is located in Missoula County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Old Town

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

Cemeteries Near Hot Springs ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Hot Springs.

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 Hot Springs - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Maillet Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northwest)
  • Ventling Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
  • Moore Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the east)
  • Markle Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Murray Memorial Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
  • Pluffe Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the south)
  • Indian Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
  • Hominsto Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the south)
  • Camas Prairie Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
  • Niarada Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the north)
  • Plains Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
  • McKay Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
  • Continue List   (13 more) ...
    • Lynch Cemetery
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
    • Paradise Cemetery
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Gingery Cemetery
      (18 miles [29 km] to the south)

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 Hot Springs in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Hot Springs.

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

  • Plains
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
  • Paradise
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
  • Eddy
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
    • Eddy is located in Sanders County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Eddy
  • Saint Regis
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)

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

Newspapers Published in Hot Springs ...

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 Hot Springs.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Hot Springs, 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 Hot Springs.

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 either 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 Hot Springs:

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 Hot Springs, 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 drawn from Point A (ie- Hot Springs) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.