RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Texas >> Cameron County >> Holly Beach >> Genealogy HelperIndex...










Learn About
The Commemorative
Quarter for
Texas

The Commemorative Quarter for Texas





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 Holly Beach (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 Holly Beach. 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 Holly Beach ...

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 Holly Beach: Holly Bch.

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 northwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most hospitals were in the next county to the west. 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 west 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.

Holly Beach is located in Cameron 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 Cameron County: Hidalgo & Willacy.

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

  • Cameron County     (The home county of Holly Beach)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Holly Beach, with the one closest to Holly Beach listed first.
    • Laguna Vista
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the south)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Laguna Vista have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Laguna Vista
      • Laguna Vista is located in Cameron County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 3,217 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Laguna Vista <2>
    • Laguna Heights
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Laguna Heights have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Laguna Heights
      • Laguna Heights is located in Cameron County
    • Port Isabel
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southeast)
    • Bayview
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
    • South Padre Island
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the east)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for South Padre Island have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for South Padre Island
      • South Padre Island is located in Cameron County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 2,752 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for South Padre Island <2>
    • Del Mar Heights
      (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Del Mar Heights have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Del Mar Heights
      • Del Mar Heights is located in Cameron County
      • Del Mar Heights has also been known as:
      • Del Mar Heights Colonia
    • Chula Vista - Orason
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the southwest)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Chula Vista - Orason
      • Chula Vista - Orason is located in Cameron County
    • Boca Chica
      (11 miles [17.7 km] to the southeast)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Boca Chica
      • Boca Chica is located in Cameron County
      • Former names for Boca Chica:
      • Kennedy Shores
      • Kopernik Shores
    • Laureles
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Laureles have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Laureles
      • Laureles is located in Cameron County
    • Los Fresnos
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Los Fresnos have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Los Fresnos
      • Los Fresnos is located in Cameron County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 7,826 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Los Fresnos <2>
    • Arroyo Gardens - La Tina Ranch
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Indian Lake
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Indian Lake have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Indian Lake
      • Indian Lake is located in Cameron County
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 864 people
    • Clarksville ‑ Historic
      (14 miles [22.5 km] to the southeast)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Clarksville have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Clarksville
      • Clarksville is located in Cameron County
  • Willacy County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Holly Beach, with the one closest to Holly Beach listed first.
    • Santa Monica
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Santa Monica have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Santa Monica
      • Santa Monica is located in Willacy County
    • Port Mansfield
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Port Mansfield have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Port Mansfield
      • Port Mansfield is located in Willacy County
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Port Mansfield <2>
    • Willamar
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Willamar have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Willamar
      • Willamar is located in Willacy County

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

Newspapers Published in Holly Beach ...

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 62 newspapers that have been published in the area around Holly Beach.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Holly Beach, there are papers which were published within 25 miles [40.2 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Holly Beach.

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 Holly Beach:

Cemeteries Near Holly Beach ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Holly Beach.

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

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

  • Soldiers Cemetery
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the west)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Soldiers Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Soldiers Cemetery
  • La Leona Cemetery
    (13 miles [20.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the La Leona Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the La Leona Cemetery
  • Rio Hondo Community Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Rio Hondo Community Cemetery is located outside and to the east of Rio Hondo.
    • The Rio Hondo Community Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Jack Carpenter Cemetery
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Rio Hondo Community Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #2188890 <4>
  • Monte Meta Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the west)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Monte Meta Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Monte Meta Cemetery
  • Buena Vista Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the southwest)
  • Rio Hondo City Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the west)
  • Old City Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Old City Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Old City Cemetery
  • Santa Rosalia Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the southwest)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Santa Rosalia Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Santa Rosalia Cemetery
  • Southmost Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the south)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Southmost Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Southmost Cemetery
  • San Benito Memorial Park Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the west)
  • San Benito City Cemetery
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the west)
  • Zepeda Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the west)
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Zepeda Cemetery is located 2 miles [3.2 km]<3> to the northwest of La Paloma.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Zepeda Cemetery
  • Continue List   (9 more) ...
    • Sabino Cemetery
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Sabino Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Sabino Cemetery
    • San Antonio Cemetery
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northwest)
      • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the San Antonio Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<1> The coordinates still need to be verified.
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the San Antonio Cemetery
    • Tanquesitos Cemetery
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northwest)

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.<5>

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

  • Brownsville
    (19 miles [30.6 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 Holly Beach. See our List of 1890's Communities around Holly Beach.

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

The official website for Cameron County: www.co.cameron.tx.us/

The official website for State of Texas: https://texas.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>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.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Holly Beach) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Holly Beach. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 26.1351, Longitude: -97.2914       In this case, the coordinates for Holly Beach have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<4>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.
<5>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 Holly Beach, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.




 

Copyright 2024
All Rights Reserved

Thank you for visiting our website.

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: 07 Apr 2024