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The Commemorative Quarter for Montana





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 Virden (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 Virden. 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 and 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.

Virden is located in Toole County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Toole County: Glacier, Liberty & Pondera.

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

  • Toole County     (The home county of Virden)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Virden, with the one closest to Virden listed first.
    • Shelby
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Ethridge
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
    • Kevin
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Kevin have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kevin
      • Kevin is located in Toole County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 136 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Kevin <1>
    • Oilmont
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
    • Sunburst
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Sunburst have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sunburst
      • Sunburst is located in Toole County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 328 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Sunburst <1>
    • Galata
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
    • Rim Rock Colony
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rim Rock Colony
      • Rim Rock Colony is located in Toole County
  • Glacier County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Virden, with the one closest to Virden listed first.
    • Cut Bank
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the west)
    • Santa Rita
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northwest)
  • Pondera County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Virden, with the one closest to Virden listed first.
    • Ledger
      (18 miles [29 km] to the south)
    • Valier
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Valier have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Valier
      • Valier is located in Pondera County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 474 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Valier <1>
    • Conrad
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)

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

Cemeteries Near Virden ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Virden.

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 Virden covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.

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

  • Toole County Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Toole County Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Toole County Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Valley View Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the east)
  • Shelby Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Shelby Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Shelby Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Dunkirk Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the east)
  • Sacred Heart Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
  • Camrose Colony Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
  • Devon Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
  • Crown Hill Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northwest)
  • Lakeview Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Lakeview Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Lakeview Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Omholt Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Omholt Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Omholt Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Hillside Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Hillside Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Hillside Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Sunburst Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Sunburst Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Sunburst Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Continue List   (12 more) ...
    • Glacier Colony Cemetery
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northwest)
    • Galata Cemetery
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Galata Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Galata Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Rimrock Colony Cemetery
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Rimrock Colony Cemetery
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for the Rimrock Colony Cemetery. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<5>
      • To give a relative sense of its location, the Rimrock Colony Cemetery is located 8 miles [12.9 km]<4> to the east of Sunburst.
      • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2133210 <3>

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.<6>

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

  • Conrad
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)

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

Newspapers Published in Virden ...

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 27 newspapers that have been published in the area around Virden.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Virden, there are papers which were published within 25 miles [40.2 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Virden.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we begin 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 Virden:

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

The official website for State of Montana: https://mt.gov/

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 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.
<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 '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- Virden) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Virden. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 48.5244, Longitude: -111.9078       In this case, the coordinates for Virden have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>An 'estimated' location is one where we have been given GPS coordinates, but are unable to verify the accuracy of those coordinates. That said, we have some confidence that we have placed the marker near the actual location. A typical reason for being unable to verify a location is that it might be on private property or maybe historic and gone without an obvious trace.
<6>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 Virden, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 28 Apr 2025