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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 Merino (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 Merino. 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 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.

Merino is located in Judith Basin 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 Judith Basin County: Cascade, Chouteau, Fergus, Meagher & Wheatland.

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

  • Judith Basin County     (The home county of Merino)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Merino, with the one closest to Merino listed first.
    • Geyser
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
    • Stanford
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Arrow Creek
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Arrow Creek is located in Judith Basin County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Arrow Creek
    • Windham
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the southeast)
      • Windham is located in Judith Basin County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Windham
    • Raynesford
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
    • Sapphire Village
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
      • Sapphire Village is located in Judith Basin County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sapphire Village
    • Moccasin
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Hobson
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the southeast)
      • Hobson is located in Judith Basin County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hobson
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 229 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Hobson <1>
  • Cascade County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Merino, with the one closest to Merino listed first.
    • Monarch
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southwest)
    • Armington Junction
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the west)
      • Armington Junction is located in Cascade County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Armington Junction
    • Armington
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the west)
      • Armington is located in Cascade County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Armington
    • Neihart
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southwest)
    • Belt
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
      • Belt is located in Cascade County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Belt
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 568 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Belt <1>
  • Chouteau County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Merino, with the one closest to Merino listed first.
    • Geraldine
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the north)
    • Big Sag
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northwest)
      • Big Sag is located in Chouteau County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Big Sag
    • Highwood
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Fergus County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Merino, with the one closest to Merino listed first.
    • Coffee Creek
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Denton
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
    • Danvers
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)
      • Danvers is located in Fergus County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Danvers

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

Cemeteries Near Merino ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Merino.

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

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

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

  • Surprise Creek Colony Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the south)
  • Geyser Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
  • Stanford Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southeast)
  • McLeish Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Lone Tree Park Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southwest)
  • Geer Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
  • Strouf Pioneer Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the east)
  • Coffee Creek Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Lehigh Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Kibbey Cemetery
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
  • Barker Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the southwest)
  • Benchland Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
  • Continue List   (21 more) ...
    • Larson Cemetery
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
    • Dry Fork Road Cemetery
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Hillcrest Cemetery
      (20 miles [32.2 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 Merino in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Merino.

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

  • Stanford
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Denton
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
  • Monarch
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southwest)
  • Armington
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the west)
    • Armington is located in Cascade County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Armington
  • Neihart
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southwest)
  • Belt
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Belt is located in Cascade County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Belt
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 568 people
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Belt <1>

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

Newspapers Published in Merino ...

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 24 newspapers that have been published in the area around Merino.

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

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we first turn to the websites from Cyndi's List, FamilySearch and Genealogy Trails. These professional and volunteer 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 Merino:

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 Merino, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a '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- Merino) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.