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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 Brookfield (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 Brookfield. 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 southeast 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 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 east 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.

Brookfield is located in Chester County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Chester County: New Castle (DE), Cecil (MD), Berks, Delaware, Lancaster & Montgomery.

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

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

Cemeteries Near Brookfield ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Brookfield.

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

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

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Brookfield, with the one closest to Brookfield 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>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that in 1895, Brookfield had railroad service and no post office.

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

  • Norway
    (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
  • Cossart
    (Less than 2 miles to the south)
    • Cossart is located in Chester County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cossart
  • Fairville
    (Less than 2 miles to the west)
    • Fairville is located in Chester County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fairville
  • Granogue
    (Less than 2 miles to the south)
    • Granogue is located in New Castle County (DE)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Granogue
  • Chadds Ford
    (Less than 2 miles to the north)
  • Chadds Ford Junction
    (Less than 2 miles to the north)
    • Chadds Ford Junction is located in Chester County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Chadds Ford Junction
  • Centreville
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southwest)
  • Guyencourt
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the south)
    • Guyencourt is located in New Castle County (DE)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Guyencourt
  • Elam
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the east)
    • Elam is located in Delaware County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Elam
  • Brandywine Summit
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Brandywine Summit is located in Delaware County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Brandywine Summit
  • Mendenhall
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the west)
  • Talleyville
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Continue List   (16 more) ...
    • Pocopson
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northwest)
      • Pocopson is located in Chester County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pocopson
    • Dilworthtown
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Dilworthtown is located in Chester County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dilworthtown
    • Seal
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the north)

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

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we first turn to 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 Brookfield:

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 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Brookfield) 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 Brookfield, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.