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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 Downs (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 Downs. 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 northwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most doctors 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.

Downs is located in Lincoln County.

To see how the shape of Washington'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: Adams, Ferry, Grant, Okanogan, Spokane, Stevens & Whitman.

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

  • Lincoln County     (The home county of Downs)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Downs, with the one closest to Downs listed first.
    • Mohler
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Mohler is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mohler
    • Harrington
      (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
    • Earl
      (12 miles [19.3 km] to the north)
      • Earl is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Earl
    • Odessa
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the west)
    • Bluestem
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Bluestem is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bluestem
    • Rocklyn
      (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
      • Rocklyn is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rocklyn
    • Sprague
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
    • Omans
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
      • Omans is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Omans
    • Davenport
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
    • Edwall
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
    • Creston
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
    • Mondovi
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northeast)
      • Mondovi is located in Lincoln County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mondovi
    • Wilbur
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Adams County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Downs, with the one closest to Downs listed first.
    • Ritzville
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
    • Paha ‑ Historic
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
      • Paha is located in Adams County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Paha
    • Lind
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
  • Grant County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Downs, with the one closest to Downs listed first.
    • Krupp
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
      • Krupp is located in Grant County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Krupp
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 51 people
    • Marlin
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the west)
      • Marlin is located in Grant County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Marlin
  • Spokane County
    • Tyler
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the east)
      • Tyler is located in Spokane County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tyler
  • Whitman County
    • Lamont
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)

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

Cemeteries Near Downs ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Downs.

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

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

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

  • Odessa Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the west)
  • Freedensfeld Cemetery
    (15 miles [24.1 km] to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Freedensfeld Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Freedensfeld Cemetery is located 10 miles [16.1 km]<2> to the north of Odessa.
    • The Freedensfeld Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Quast Cemetery
  • Memorial Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
  • Ritzville Memorial Cemetery
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
  • Sassin Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the east)
  • Lake View Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the east)
  • Macabee Cemetery
    (19 miles [30.6 km] to the east)
  • Edwall Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
  • Mountain View Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
  • Pleasant Valley Cemetery
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
  • Ammaus Cemetery
    (23 miles [37 km] to the west)
  • Paha Cemetery
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
  • Continue List   (10 more) ...
    • Wheat Ridge Cemetery
      (24 miles [38.6 km] to the northwest)
    • Rockdale Cemetery
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the east)
    • Tolonen Cemetery
      (25 miles [40.2 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.<4>

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

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

  • Harrington
    (10 miles [16.1 km] to the northeast)
  • Earl
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the north)
    • Earl is located in Lincoln County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Earl
  • Ritzville
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
  • Rocklyn
    (18 miles [29 km] to the north)
    • Rocklyn is located in Lincoln County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rocklyn
  • Sprague
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
  • Omans
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the northeast)
    • Omans is located in Lincoln County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Omans
  • Davenport
    (22 miles [35.4 km] to the northeast)
  • Paha ‑ Historic
    (24 miles [38.6 km] to the south)
    • Paha is located in Adams County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Paha
  • Creston
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the north)
  • Mondovi
    (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northeast)
    • Mondovi is located in Lincoln County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Mondovi
  • Lind
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the south)
  • Tyler
    (29 miles [46.7 km] to the east)
    • Tyler is located in Spokane County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Tyler

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

Newspapers Published in Downs ...

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 34 newspapers that have been published in the area around Downs.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Downs, there are papers which were published within 30 miles [48.3 km]<2>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Downs.

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 Downs:

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