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The Commemorative Quarter for Washington





Our Genealogy Helper

Introduction ...

So far, we found very little information about Ruby. The little that we've found leads us believe that the community is historic.<1>

We've added Ruby to our Gazetteer with the hope that we can develop more information. If you can help us with Ruby, please Contact Us.

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 Ruby (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 Ruby. 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 southwest 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 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.

Although our information shows that the community of Ruby is historic, it would have been located within present day Whatcom County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Whatcom County: Okanogan, San Juan & Skagit.

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

  • Skagit County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Ruby, with the one closest to Ruby listed first.
    • Marblemount
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Rockport
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the southwest)

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

Cemeteries Near Ruby ...

We're sorry, but we don't know of any cemeteries in the area around Ruby.

This is a new section of our Gazetteer and we're still collecting data about cemeteries and their location. If you know of a cemetery that should be included, please let us know.

We are looking for information such as the name of the cemetery, its GPS location, whether the cemetery is still in use or if it is historic (ie- defunct, abandoned,  etc.). If it applies, we would also like to learn of any past or alternate names that the cemetery has been known by.

If you need information about a burial or interment, photos, transcripts, how to contact the cemetery or local authorities, please visit our collection of Genealogy Websites.

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.

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

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

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 helpful 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 Ruby:

The official website for Whatcom County: www.co.whatcom.wa.us/

The official website for State of Washington: https://wa.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>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 Ruby, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 29 Apr 2025