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Our Genealogy Helper

Introduction ...

So far, we found very little information about Florence. The little that we've found leads us believe that the community is historic.<1>

We've added Florence to our Gazetteer with the hope that we can develop more information. If you can help us with Florence, please Contact Us.

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 Florence (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 Florence. 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.

Although our information shows that the community of Florence is historic, it would have been located within present day Hand County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Hand County: Beadle, Buffalo, Faulk, Hyde, Jerauld & Spink.

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

  • Hand County     (The home county of Florence)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Florence, with the one closest to Florence listed first.
    • Polo
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
      • Polo is located in Hand County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Polo
      • Estimated population in 2014: 227 people
    • Miller
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
    • Saint Lawrence
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
    • Ree Heights
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Ames
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
      • Ames is located in Hand County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ames
  • Beadle County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Florence, with the one closest to Florence listed first.
    • Wessington
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Bonilla
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
      • Bonilla is located in Beadle County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bonilla
    • Hitchcock
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)
  • Faulk County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Florence, with the one closest to Florence listed first.
    • Orient
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
    • Rockham
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Miranda
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the north)
      • Miranda is located in Faulk County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Miranda
      • Estimated population in 2014: 122 people
    • Zell
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Zell is located in Faulk County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Zell
      • Estimated population in 2014: 65 people
    • Faulkton
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the north)
    • Devoe
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the north)
      • Devoe is located in Faulk County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Devoe
      • Estimated population in 2014: 23 people
  • Hyde County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Florence, with the one closest to Florence listed first.
    • Bramhall ‑ Historic
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
      • Bramhall is located in Hyde County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bramhall
    • Highmore
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
  • Spink County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Florence, with the one closest to Florence listed first.
    • Spottswood
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
      • Spottswood is located in Spink County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Spottswood
    • Tulare
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • Redfield
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)

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

Cemeteries Near Florence ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Florence.

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

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

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

  • Howell Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the north)
  • Alden Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
  • Sunbeam Cemetery
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the east)
  • Calvary Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Burdette Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the east)
  • Beulah Cemetery
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southeast)
  • St. Anns Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for St. Anns Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the St. Anns Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located outside and to the east of Miller.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #97512 <3>
  • St. Lawrence Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
  • St. Michaels Cemetery
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northwest)
  • G A R Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
  • Orient - Prairieview Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the north)
  • Buffalo Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the east)
  • Continue List   (31 more) ...

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.

Florence itself is historic and was described in the Rand McNally Atlas as having a population of 20 people in 1895 with a post office and no railroad service. In 2014, Florence had a population of 374 people.

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

  • Burdette
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the east)
    • Burdette is located in Hand County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Burdette
  • Miller
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the south)
  • Saint Lawrence
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the south)
  • Orient
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the north)
  • Ree Heights
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Rockham
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
  • Bramhall ‑ Historic
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
    • Bramhall is located in Hyde County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bramhall
  • Zell
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Zell is located in Faulk County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Zell
    • Estimated population in 2014: 65 people
  • Miranda
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the north)
    • Miranda is located in Faulk County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Miranda
    • Estimated population in 2014: 122 people
  • Wessington
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Spottswood
    (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • Spottswood is located in Spink County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Spottswood
  • Tulare
    (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
  • Continue List   (12 more) ...
    • Faulkton
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the north)
    • Sweetland ‑ Historic
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
      • Sweetland is located in Hand County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Sweetland
    • Highmore
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)

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

Newspapers Published in Florence ...

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 32 newspapers that have been published in the area around Florence.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Florence, 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 Florence.

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 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 Florence:

Footnotes ...

<1>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 Florence, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<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 obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Florence) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.