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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 Chappel (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 Chappel. 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 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 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.

Chappel is located in Dona Ana County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Dona Ana County: Luna, Otero, Sierra & El Paso (TX).

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

  • Dona Ana County     (The home county of Chappel)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Chappel, with the one closest to Chappel listed first.
    • Afton ‑ Historic
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southeast)
      • Afton is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Afton
    • Fairacres
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the east)
    • Mesilla
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • San Ysidro
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • San Ysidro is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for San Ysidro
    • Mesilla Park
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
    • University Park
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
      • University Park is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for University Park
    • Dona Ana
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Hill
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
      • Hill is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hill
    • Las Cruces
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Leasburg ‑ Historic
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
      • Leasburg is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Leasburg
    • Radium Springs
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Lanark ‑ Historic
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Lanark is located in Dona Ana County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lanark
  • Luna County
    • Nutt ‑ Historic
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Nutt is located in Luna County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Nutt

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

Cemeteries Near Chappel ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Chappel.

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

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

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

  • Hillcrest Memorial Gardens Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
  • Lewis Flats Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lewis Flats Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Lewis Flats Cemetery is located 11 miles [17.7 km]<2> to the east of Deming.
    • The Lewis Flats Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Lewis Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #38181 <3>
  • San Albino Cemetery
    (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for San Albino Cemetery
    • The San Albino Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Mesilla Valley Cemetery
  • Odd Fellow Cemetery
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
  • St. Joseph Cemetery
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
  • Tortugas Cemetery
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
  • Dona Ana County Cemetery
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
  • Community Cemetery
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Community Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Community Cemetery is located in Las Cruces.
  • St. Josephs Cemetery
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)

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

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

  • Aden ‑ Historic
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Aden is located in Dona Ana County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Aden
  • Afton ‑ Historic
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Afton is located in Dona Ana County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Afton
  • Mesilla
    (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
  • Mesilla Park
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
  • Las Cruces
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Dona Ana
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
  • Leasburg ‑ Historic
    (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Leasburg is located in Dona Ana County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Leasburg
  • Lanark ‑ Historic
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Lanark is located in Dona Ana County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lanark
  • Mesquite
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)
  • Tonuco
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the north)
    • Tonuco is located in Dona Ana County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tonuco

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

Newspapers Published in Chappel ...

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 53 newspapers that have been published in the area around Chappel.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Chappel, there are papers which were published within 25 miles [40.2 km]<2>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Chappel.

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 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 Chappel:

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 drawn from Point A (ie- Chappel) 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 Chappel, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.