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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 Cotton Flat (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 Cotton Flat. 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 Cotton Flat ...

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 have occurred.

For example, a typical abbreviation for Cotton Flat: Cotton Flt.

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.

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 and doctors 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.

Cotton Flat is located in Midland County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Midland County: Andrews, Ector, Glasscock, Martin, Reagan & Upton.

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

  • Midland County     (The home county of Cotton Flat)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cotton Flat, with the one closest to Cotton Flat listed first.
    • Midland
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
    • Greenwood
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Greenwood
      • Greenwood is located in Midland County
  • Ector County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cotton Flat, with the one closest to Cotton Flat listed first.
    • Odessa
      (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • Gardendale
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
    • Scharbauer City
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Scharbauer City have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Scharbauer City
      • Scharbauer City is located in Ector County
    • West Odessa
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for West Odessa have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for West Odessa
      • West Odessa is located in Ector County
  • Martin County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Cotton Flat, with the one closest to Cotton Flat listed first.
    • Stanton
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Tarzan
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Tarzan have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tarzan
      • Tarzan is located in Martin County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Tarzan <1>
    • Lenorah
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Lenorah have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lenorah
      • Lenorah is located in Martin County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Lenorah <1>
  • Upton County
    • Midkiff
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Midkiff have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Midkiff
      • Midkiff is located in Upton County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Midkiff <1>

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

Cemeteries Near Cotton Flat ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Cotton Flat.

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

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

  • Fairview Cemetery
    (5 miles [8 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Fairview Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Fairview Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Rest Haven Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Rest Haven Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Rest Haven Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Valhalla Mausoleum
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the north)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Valhalla Mausoleum
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Valhalla Mausoleum have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • American Heritage Cemetery
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
  • Sunset Memorial Gardens
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Sunset Memorial Gardens
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Sunset Memorial Gardens have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
  • Los Angeles Gardens Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Odessa Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Rose Hill Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Evergreen Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Evergreen Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Evergreen Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<2> 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>

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

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

  • Midland
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the north)
  • Warfield
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the west)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Warfield have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Warfield
    • Warfield is located in Midland County
  • Germania
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Germania have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Germania
    • Germania is located in Midland County
  • Odessa
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
  • Stanton
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
  • Douro
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Douro have been provided by the GNIS.<2> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Douro
    • Douro is located in Ector County

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

Newspapers Published in Cotton Flat ...

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 Cotton Flat.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Cotton Flat, there are papers which were published within 21 miles [33.8 km]<5>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Cotton Flat.

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 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 Cotton Flat:

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

The official website for Midland County: www.co.midland.tx.us/

The official website for State of Texas: https://texas.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>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.
<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 Cotton Flat, 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' (or 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- Cotton Flat) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Cotton Flat. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 31.9290, Longitude: -102.0599       In this case, the coordinates for Cotton Flat have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 16 Jul 2025