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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 Decatur (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 Decatur. 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 southwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most hospitals and doctors were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Decatur is located in Otsego County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Otsego County: Chenango, Delaware, Herkimer, Madison, Montgomery & Schoharie.

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

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

Cemeteries Near Decatur ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Decatur.

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

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

  • Decatur Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Decatur Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Decatur Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Ferris Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Ferris Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Ferris Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • East Worcester Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the East Worcester Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the East Worcester Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Maple View Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Maple View Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Maple View Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Draper Hill Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Draper Hill Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Draper Hill Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Maple Grove Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Maple Grove Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Maple Grove Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • St. Joseph's RC Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the St. Joseph's RC Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the St. Joseph's RC Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Westford Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Westford Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Westford Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Post Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Post Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Post Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • South Valley Cemetery
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the South Valley Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the South Valley Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Baptist Church Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Baptist Church Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Baptist Church Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Lutheranville Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Lutheranville Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Lutheranville Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Continue List   (484 more) ...
    • Houck Cemetery
      (5 miles [8 km] to the northeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Houck Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Houck Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Winnie Cemetery
      (5 miles [8 km] to the north)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Winnie Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Winnie Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Elk Creek Cemetery
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southwest)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Elk Creek Cemetery
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Elk Creek Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.

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>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that Decatur had a population of 138 people in 1895 with a post office and no railroad service.

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

  • Worcester
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the south)
  • East Worcester
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for East Worcester have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for East Worcester
    • East Worcester is located in Otsego County
  • Westford
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the west)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Westford have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Westford
    • Westford is located in Otsego County
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Westford <1>
  • South Valley
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
  • Pleasant Brook
    (5 miles [8 km] to the north)
  • West Richmondville
    (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for West Richmondville have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for West Richmondville
    • West Richmondville is located in Schoharie County
  • Elk Creek
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Elk Creek have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Elk Creek
    • Elk Creek is located in Otsego County
  • Middlefield
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Charlotteville
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Charlotteville have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Charlotteville
    • Charlotteville is located in Schoharie County
    • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Charlotteville <1>
  • Roseboom
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
  • Seward
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northeast)
  • Westville
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the west)
  • Continue List   (22 more) ...

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

Newspapers Published in Decatur ...

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 99 newspapers that have been published in the area around Decatur.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Decatur, there are papers which were published within 19 miles [30.6 km]<5>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Decatur.

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 Decatur:

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

The official website for Otsego County: www.otsegocounty.com/

The official website for State of New York: https://www.ny.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>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.
<3>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.
<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 Decatur, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<5>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- Decatur) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Decatur. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 42.6444, Longitude: -74.7252    









 

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This page was last modified/updated: 29 Apr 2025