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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 Sunny Side (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 Sunny Side. 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 northeast 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 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 east 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.

Sunny Side is located in Dare 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 Dare County: Hyde & Tyrrell.

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

  • Dare County     (The home county of Sunny Side)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Sunny Side, with the one closest to Sunny Side listed first.
    • Fort Raleigh City
      (Less than 2 miles to the north)
      • Fort Raleigh City is located in Dare County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Raleigh City
    • Manteo
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Manns Harbor
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southwest)
    • Nags Head
      (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
    • Whalebone
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
      • Whalebone is located in Dare County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Whalebone
    • Kill Devil Hills
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
    • Wanchese
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Kitty Hawk
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the north)
    • Southern Shores
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
    • Buffalo City
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
      • Buffalo City is located in Dare County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Buffalo City
    • Stumpy Point
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
      • Stumpy Point is located in Dare County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stumpy Point
    • George Town Sands
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the north)
      • George Town Sands is located in Dare County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for George Town Sands
  • Camden County
    • Alder Branch
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the northwest)
      • Alder Branch is located in Camden County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Alder Branch
  • Currituck County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Sunny Side, with the one closest to Sunny Side listed first.
    • Point Harbor
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northwest)
    • Harbinger
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Powells Point
      (18 miles [29 km] to the northwest)
    • Jarvisburg
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Grandy
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northwest)
    • Bertha
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
      • Bertha is located in Currituck County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bertha
    • Poplar Branch
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Aydlett
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
      • Aydlett is located in Currituck County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Aydlett
  • Tyrrell County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Sunny Side, with the one closest to Sunny Side listed first.
    • Fort Landing
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
      • Fort Landing is located in Tyrrell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Landing
    • Alligator
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
      • Alligator is located in Tyrrell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Alligator
    • Columbia
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the west)

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

Cemeteries Near Sunny Side ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Sunny Side.

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 Sunny Side - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Willis Tillett Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the northeast)
  • Hilltop Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
  • Baum Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the north)
  • Austin Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Austin Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Austin Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the west of Kitty Hawk.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #46759 <2>
  • Shiloh Church Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
  • Aydlett, Sawyer & Guard Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northwest)
  • Cahoon Family Cemetery
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the southwest)
  • Salvo Campground Cemetery
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southeast)

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

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

  • Manns Harbor
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southwest)
  • Manteo
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Nags Head
    (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
  • Colington
    (5 miles [8 km] to the north)
    • Colington is located in Dare County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Colington
  • Mashoes
    (5 miles [8 km] to the northwest)
    • Mashoes is located in Dare County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mashoes
  • Wanchese
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
  • Buffalo City
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the southwest)
    • Buffalo City is located in Dare County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Buffalo City
  • Harbinger
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
  • East Lake
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
    • East Lake is located in Dare County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for East Lake
  • Stumpy Point
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
    • Stumpy Point is located in Dare County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Stumpy Point
  • Fort Landing
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
    • Fort Landing is located in Tyrrell County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fort Landing
  • Jarvisburg
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northwest)
  • Continue List   (5 more) ...
    • Rodanthe
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Poplar Branch
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Gum Neck
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southwest)
      • Gum Neck is located in Tyrrell County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gum Neck

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

Newspapers Published in Sunny Side ...

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 11 newspapers that have been published in the area around Sunny Side.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Sunny Side, there are papers which were published within 29 miles [46.7 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Sunny Side.

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 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 Sunny Side:

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