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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 Opal (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 Opal. 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 doctors and hospitals 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.

Opal is located in Meade County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Meade County: Butte, Haakon, Lawrence, Pennington & Ziebach.

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

  • Meade County     (The home county of Opal)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Opal, with the one closest to Opal listed first.
    • Cedar Canyon
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for Cedar Canyon. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Cedar Canyon
      • Cedar Canyon is located in Meade County
      • Google driving directions:
      • From your current location to Cedar Canyon
      • From Opal to Cedar Canyon
    • Red Owl
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
    • Marcus
      (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
    • Fairpoint
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Fairpoint have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fairpoint
      • Fairpoint is located in Meade County
    • White Owl
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the south)
    • Faith
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Faith have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Faith
      • Faith is located in Meade County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 410 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Faith <2>
    • Enning
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the south)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Enning have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Enning
      • Enning is located in Meade County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Enning <2>
    • Mud Butte
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
    • Plainview
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Plainview have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Plainview
      • Plainview is located in Meade County
      • Estimated population in 2014: 55 people
    • Union Center
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Howes
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southeast)
  • Perkins County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Opal, with the one closest to Opal listed first.
    • Usta
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Usta have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Usta
      • Usta is located in Perkins County
      • Estimated population in 2014: 22 people
    • Zeona
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)

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

Cemeteries Near Opal ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Opal.

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

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

  • Backes Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Backes Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Backes Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Pleasant Valley Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Pleasant Valley Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Pleasant Valley Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Fairpoint Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Fairpoint Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Fairpoint Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • White Owl Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the White Owl Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the White Owl Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • St. Joseph Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the St. Joseph Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the St. Joseph Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Eaglestaff Cemetery
    (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Eaglestaff Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Eaglestaff Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Faith Cemetery
    (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Faith Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Faith Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Plum Draw Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Plum Draw Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Plum Draw Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • St. Pius Cemetery
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the St. Pius Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the St. Pius Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<3> The coordinates still need to be verified.

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

Newspapers Published in Opal ...

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 11 newspapers that have been published in the area around Opal.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Opal, there are papers which were published within 27 miles [43.5 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Opal.

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 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 Opal:

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

The official website for Meade County: www.meadecounty.org/

The official website for State of South Dakota: https://www.sd.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>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.
<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 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>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Opal) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Opal. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 44.8926, Longitude: -102.4517    









 

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In closing, please keep in mind that we can not guarantee the accuracy or timeliness of the information on this website, so use with care. We encourage you to double-check the information that is critical to you.

If you've found an error or have additional information that you would like to share, please don't hesitate to write: Click here to contact us.

This page was last modified/updated: 29 Apr 2025