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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
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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 Oakley (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 Oakley. 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 hospitals 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.

Oakley is located in Pitt County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Pitt County: Beaufort, Craven, Edgecombe, Greene, Lenoir, Martin & Wilson.

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

  • Pitt County     (The home county of Oakley)
  • Beaufort County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Oakley, with the one closest to Oakley listed first.
    • Rosedale
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Chocowinity
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
    • Washington
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southeast)
    • Washington Park
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Washington Park is located in Beaufort County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Washington Park
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 429 people
    • River Road
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
      • River Road is located in Beaufort County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for River Road
    • Pinetown
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
    • Walla Watta
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Whitepost
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Bertie County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Oakley, with the one closest to Oakley listed first.
    • Drew
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Lewiston Woodville
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the north)
      • Lewiston Woodville is located in Bertie County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lewiston Woodville
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 473 people
    • Windsor
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Kelford
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
      • Kelford is located in Bertie County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Kelford
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 217 people
    • Roxobel
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
  • Edgecombe County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Oakley, with the one closest to Oakley listed first.
    • Conetoe
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northwest)
    • Coakley
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Princeville
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northwest)
    • Fairview
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
      • Fairview is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fairview
    • Hope Lodge
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Speed
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Tarboro
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • Cobb Town
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
      • Cobb Town is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cobb Town
    • Henrietta
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
      • Henrietta is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Henrietta
    • Sharp Point
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the west)
      • Sharp Point is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sharp Point
    • Summerfield
      (18 miles [29 km] to the northwest)
      • Summerfield is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Summerfield
    • Pinetops
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
  • Greene County
  • Halifax County
  • Lenoir County
  • Martin County
  • Washington County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Oakley, with the one closest to Oakley listed first.
    • Monticello ‑ Historic
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)
      • Monticello is located in Washington County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Monticello
    • Plymouth
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the east)
  • Wilson County

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

Cemeteries Near Oakley ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Oakley.

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

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

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

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.<4>

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

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

  • Parmele
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
    • Parmele is located in Martin County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Parmele
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 253 people
  • Robersonville
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
  • Bethel
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • House
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the southwest)
  • Everetts
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
  • Pactolus
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Hollands
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
    • Hollands is located in Pitt County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hollands
  • Hassell
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
  • Conetoe
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northwest)
  • Greenville
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Falkland
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
    • Falkland is located in Pitt County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Falkland
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 98 people
  • Latham
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southeast)
    • Latham is located in Beaufort County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Latham
  • Continue List   (15 more) ...
    • Coakley
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Hamilton
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
    • Mildred
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
      • Mildred is located in Edgecombe County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mildred

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

Newspapers Published in Oakley ...

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 23 newspapers that have been published in the area around Oakley.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Oakley, there are papers which were published within 14 miles [22.5 km]<2>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Oakley.

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 helpful 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 Oakley:

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