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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 Cantara (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 Cantara. 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 and doctors 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.

Cantara is primarily located in Curry County. A portion of Cantara extends into Roosevelt County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Curry County: Quay, Roosevelt, Bailey (TX), Deaf Smith (TX) & Parmer (TX).

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

  • Curry County     (The home county of Cantara)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cantara, with the one closest to Cantara listed first.
    • Melrose
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Melrose have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Melrose
      • Melrose is located in Curry County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 622 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Melrose <2>
    • Saint Vrain
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
    • Weber City
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Weber City have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Weber City
      • Weber City is located in Curry County
  • DeBaca County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cantara, with the one closest to Cantara listed first.
    • Taiban
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Fort Sumner
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
  • Quay County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cantara, with the one closest to Cantara listed first.
    • House
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the northwest)
    • McAlister
      (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
    • Ragland
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ragland
      • Ragland is located in Quay County
  • Roosevelt County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cantara, with the one closest to Cantara listed first.
    • Floyd
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Floyd have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Floyd
      • Floyd is located in Roosevelt County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 103 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Floyd <2>
    • Portales
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Portales have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Portales
      • Portales is located in Roosevelt County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 11,487 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Portales <2>

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

Cemeteries Near Cantara ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Cantara.

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

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

  • North Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the North Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the North Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Memorial Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Memorial Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Memorial Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Trotter Gravesite
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the west)
  • Tolar Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the west)
  • Benson Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the south)
  • Taiban Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Taiban Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Taiban Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Blanco Cemetery
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Blanco Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Blanco Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Floyd Cemetery
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
  • Yeakley Cemetery
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Yeakley Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Yeakley Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Field Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Field Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Field Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • McAlister Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
  • Upton Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Upton Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Upton Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Continue List   (22 more) ...
    • Upton Cemetery
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the south)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Upton Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Upton Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #38496 <3>
    • House Cemetery
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northwest)
    • Bethel Cemetery
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Bethel Cemetery
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for the Bethel Cemetery. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<5>
      • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #37953 <3>

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

Newspapers Published in Cantara ...

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 34 newspapers that have been published in the area around Cantara.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Cantara, there are papers which were published within 28 miles [45.1 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Cantara.

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 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 Cantara:

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

The official website for Curry County: www.currycounty.org/

The official website for State of New Mexico: https://www.nm.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>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.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<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 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Cantara) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Cantara. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 34.4245, Longitude: -103.7430       In this case, the coordinates for Cantara 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.




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 28 Apr 2025