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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 Tea (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 Tea. 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.

Name Variations for Tea ...

When searching records, keep in mind that names and their spelling can change over time. Our sources include documents like maps, railroad schedules, Travel, Express and Shipping Guides. Many of these documents date from the 1800's and it's common to find spelling differences.

Although we can't give a definitive list, hopefully the following will give you a feel for the variations that might occur.

Tea was originally named Byron

You might be interested in other communities that are also named Tea. More information can be found on our Tidbits & Trivia Page for Tea.

If you have information about these names (such as the reason for the change, date of change, the origin of the name), please Contact Us.

A Few Details for Tea ...

While it's still very early in our research, we found that:

  • It was incorporated in 1906.

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.

Tea is located in Lincoln 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 Lincoln County: Lyon (IA), Sioux (IA), Clay, Minnehaha, Turner & Union.

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

  • Lincoln County     (The home county of Tea)
  • Clay County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea listed first.
    • Glenwood ‑ Historic
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the south)
      • Glenwood is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Glenwood
      • Estimated population in 2014: 103 people
    • Komstad ‑ Historic
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the south)
    • Riverside ‑ Historic
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the south)
  • Hutchinson County
  • McCook County
  • Minnehaha County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea listed first.
    • El Rancho Acres
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the northwest)
      • El Rancho Acres is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for El Rancho Acres
      • Estimated population in 2014: 27 people
    • Hayward Addition
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
      • Hayward Addition is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hayward Addition
      • Estimated population in 2014: 380 people
    • Silver Valley Addition
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
      • Silver Valley Addition is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Silver Valley Addition
      • Estimated population in 2014: 112 people
    • West Acres Development
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the north)
      • West Acres Development is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for West Acres Development
      • Estimated population in 2014: 180 people
    • Webster Grove Addition
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the north)
      • Webster Grove Addition is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Webster Grove Addition
      • Estimated population in 2014: 156 people
    • Sioux Falls
      (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northeast)
    • Ellis Corner
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
      • Ellis Corner is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ellis Corner
      • Estimated population in 2014: 99 people
    • Split Rock Heights
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
      • Split Rock Heights is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Split Rock Heights
      • Estimated population in 2014: 216 people
    • Norton Acres
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Norton Acres is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Norton Acres
      • Population from the 2010 Census: 342 people
    • Pine Lakes Addition
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northeast)
      • Pine Lakes Addition is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Pine Lakes Addition
      • Population from the 2010 Census: 314 people
    • Meadow View Addition
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northeast)
      • Meadow View Addition is located in Minnehaha County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Meadow View Addition
      • Population from the 2010 Census: 538 people
    • Hartford
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Turner County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea listed first.
    • Chancellor
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southwest)
    • Davis
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the southwest)
    • Parker
      (15 miles [24.1 km] to the west)
    • Hurley
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Hooker
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
    • Monroe
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
    • Marion
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
    • Viborg
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Centerville
      (23 miles [37 km] to the south)
    • Spring Valley
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the southwest)
      • Spring Valley is located in Turner County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Spring Valley
    • Dolton
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
      • Dolton is located in Turner County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dolton
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 39 people
    • Irene
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Union County
  • Lyon County (IA)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea listed first.
    • Klondike
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the east)
    • Beloit
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Larchwood
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
    • Inwood
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Lester
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
      • Lester is located in Lyon County (IA)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lester
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 303 people
    • Alvord
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the east)
  • Rock County (MN)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea listed first.
    • Bruce
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Bruce is located in Rock County (MN)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bruce
    • Manley
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
    • Hills
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the east)
      • Hills is located in Rock County (MN)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hills
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 647 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Hills <1>
    • Beaver Creek
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Steen
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the east)

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

Cemeteries Near Tea ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Tea.

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

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

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Tea, with the one closest to Tea 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.<3>

While we didn't find Tea in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Tea.

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

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Tea ...

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 135 newspapers that have been published in the area around Tea.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Tea. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Tea and those printed in the larger area surrounding Tea.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<4> of Tea.

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 Tea:

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>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.
<3>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 Tea, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<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 from Point A (ie- Tea) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.