RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Montana >> Granite County >> Top O'Deep >> Genealogy HelperIndex...

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 Top O'Deep (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 Top O'Deep. 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 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.

Top O'Deep is primarily located in Granite County. A portion of Top O'Deep extends into Powell 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 Granite County: Beaverhead, Deer Lodge, Missoula, Powell & Ravalli.

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

  • Granite County     (The home county of Top O'Deep)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Top O'Deep, with the one closest to Top O'Deep listed first.
    • Garnet ‑ Historic
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the west)
      • Garnet is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Garnet
    • Beartown ‑ Historic
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southwest)
      • Beartown is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Beartown
    • Stump Town ‑ Historic
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the west)
      • Stump Town is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stump Town
    • Bearmouth ‑ Historic
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)
      • Bearmouth is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bearmouth
    • Drummond
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
    • New Chicago
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
      • New Chicago is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for New Chicago
    • Hall
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Stone
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
      • Stone is located in Granite County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stone
  • Lewis and Clark County
  • Missoula County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Top O'Deep, with the one closest to Top O'Deep listed first.
    • Greenough
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northwest)
    • Clinton
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
    • Seeley Lake
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Bonner
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Piltzville
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
      • Piltzville is located in Missoula County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Piltzville
    • Milltown
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the west)
  • Powell County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Top O'Deep, with the one closest to Top O'Deep listed first.
    • Reynolds City
      (Less than 2 miles to the west)
      • Reynolds City is located in Powell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Reynolds City
    • Helmville
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
    • Ovando
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Jens
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Jens is located in Powell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Jens
    • Goldcreek ‑ Historic
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Wall City
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Wall City is located in Powell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wall City
    • Phosphate
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Phosphate is located in Powell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Phosphate
    • Garrison
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)

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

Cemeteries Near Top O'Deep ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Top O'Deep.

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 Top O'Deep - one of the links might be able to help.

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

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Top O'Deep, with the one closest to Top O'Deep listed first.

  • Beartown Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southwest)
  • Sand Park Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sand Park Cemetery
    • The Sand Park Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Coloma Cemetery
  • Valley Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Valley Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Valley Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the northeast of New Chicago.
    • The Valley Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Drummond Cemetery
    • New Chicago Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #21151 <2>
  • Helmville Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
  • St. Thomas Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
  • Ovando Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Seeley Lake Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the north)
  • Memorial Meadows Cemetery
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
  • Lincoln Gulch Cemetery
    (25 miles [40.2 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.<3>

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

These communities are listed based on their distance from Top O'Deep, with the one closest to Top O'Deep listed first.

  • Beartown ‑ Historic
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Beartown is located in Granite County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Beartown
  • Drummond
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Helmville
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
  • Ovando
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northeast)
  • Potomac
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Potomac is located in Missoula County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Potomac
  • Clinton
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
  • Stone
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
    • Stone is located in Granite County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stone
  • Goldcreek ‑ Historic
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Pioneer ‑ Historic
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Pioneer is located in Powell County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pioneer
  • Bonner
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
  • Garrison
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)

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

Newspapers Published in Top O'Deep ...

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 6 newspapers that have been published in the area around Top O'Deep.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Top O'Deep, there are papers which were published within 26 miles [41.8 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Top O'Deep.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we start with 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 Top O'Deep:

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>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.
<3>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 Top O'Deep, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<4>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Top O'Deep) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.