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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 Pharr (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 Pharr. 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 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.

Pharr is located in Hidalgo County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Hidalgo County: Brooks, Cameron, Kenedy, Starr & Willacy.

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

  • Hidalgo County     (The home county of Pharr)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pharr, with the one closest to Pharr listed first.
    • San Juan
      (Less than 2 miles to the east)
    • Citriana Village
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the east)
      • Citriana Village is located in Hidalgo County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Citriana Village
      • Citriana Village has also been known as:
      • Citriana Village Colonia
    • McAllen
      (2 miles [3.2 km] to the west)
    • Alamo
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the east)
    • Campo Alto
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the east)
    • Lopezville
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)
    • North Alamo
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)
      • North Alamo is located in Hidalgo County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North Alamo
    • Plumosa Village
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
      • Plumosa Village is located in Hidalgo County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Plumosa Village
      • Plumosa Village has also been known as:
      • Plumosa Village Colonia
    • Southside Village
      (4 miles [6.4 km] to the southeast)
      • Southside Village is located in Hidalgo County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Southside Village
      • Southside Village has also been known as:
      • Southside Village Colonia
    • North Alamo Village
      (5 miles [8 km] to the east)
      • North Alamo Village is located in Hidalgo County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North Alamo Village
      • North Alamo Village has also been known as:
      • North Alamo Village Colonia
    • South Alamo
      (5 miles [8 km] to the southeast)
    • Murillo
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northeast)
    • Nurillo
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northeast)
  • Cameron County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pharr, with the one closest to Pharr listed first.
    • Bixby
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
    • Ratamosa
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
      • Ratamosa is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ratamosa
      • Ratamosa has also been known as:
      • Ratamosa Colonia
    • North La Feria Village
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the east)
      • North La Feria Village is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for North La Feria Village
      • North La Feria Village has also been known as:
      • North La Feria Village Colonia
    • Solis
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the east)
      • Solis is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Solis
      • Solis has also been known as:
      • Solis Colonia
    • Arroyo Alto
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Arroyo Alto is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Arroyo Alto
    • Grand Acres
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Grand Acres is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Grand Acres
    • La Feria North
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
    • La Feria
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
    • Longoria Townsite
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Longoria Townsite is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Longoria Townsite
      • Longoria Townsite has also been known as:
      • Longoria Townsite Colonia
    • Santa Maria
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
    • Santa Rosa
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
    • Tierra Bonita
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Tierra Bonita is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tierra Bonita
      • Tierra Bonita has also been known as:
      • Tierra Bonita Colonia
    • Windsong Village
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the east)
      • Windsong Village is located in Cameron County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Windsong Village
      • Windsong Village has also been known as:
      • Windsong Village Colonia
  • Starr County
  • Willacy County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pharr, with the one closest to Pharr listed first.
    • Zapata Ranch
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Zapata Ranch is located in Willacy County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Zapata Ranch
      • Zapata Ranch has also been known as:
      • Zapata Ranch Colonia
    • Lasara
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Sebastian
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Lyford South
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Lyford
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Ranchette Estates
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Ranchette Estates is located in Willacy County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ranchette Estates
      • Ranchette Estates has also been known as:
      • Ranchette Estates Colonia

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

Cemeteries Near Pharr ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Pharr.

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

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

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Pharr, with the one closest to Pharr 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.<4>

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

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

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

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Pharr ...

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 42 newspapers that have been published in the area around Pharr.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Pharr. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Pharr and those printed in the larger area surrounding Pharr.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 7 miles [11.3 km]<3> of Pharr.

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 Pharr:

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