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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 Foster (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 Foster. 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.

Foster is located in Converse County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Converse County: Albany, Campbell, Carbon, Johnson, Natrona, Niobrara, Platte & Weston.

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

  • Converse County     (The home county of Foster)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Foster, with the one closest to Foster listed first.
    • Orin
      (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for Orin. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Orin
      • Orin is located in Converse County
    • Douglas
      (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Shawnee
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the east)
    • Esterbrook
      (18 miles [29 km] to the south)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Esterbrook
      • Esterbrook is located in Converse County
    • Lost Springs
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
    • Boxelder
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
      • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for Boxelder. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Boxelder
      • Boxelder is located in Converse County
  • Albany County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Foster, with the one closest to Foster listed first.
    • Binford
      (23 miles [37 km] to the south)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Binford
      • Binford is located in Albany County
    • Toltec
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southwest)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Toltec
      • Toltec is located in Albany County
  • Niobrara County
    • Keeline
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Keeline
      • Keeline is located in Niobrara County
  • Platte County
    • Glendo
      (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)

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

Cemeteries Near Foster ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Foster.

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

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

  • Douglas Park Cemetery
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the northwest)
  • Pioneer Cemetery
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
  • Ft. Fetterman Cemetery
    (14 miles [22.5 km] to the northwest)
  • Horseshoe Cemetery
    (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Horseshoe Cemetery
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the Horseshoe Cemetery is a large cemetery that is located 2 miles [3.2 km]<4> to the northeast of Glendo.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #84047 <3>
  • Newell Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the south)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Newell Cemetery
    • The Newell Cemetery has also been known as:
    • Esterbrook Cemetery
    • Springhill Cemetery
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #1997059 <3>
  • Prairie View Cemetery
    (21 miles [33.8 km] to the east)
  • H A Unthank Grave
    (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the H A Unthank Grave
    • To give a relative sense of its location, the H A Unthank Grave is located 4 miles [6.4 km]<4> to the northwest of Glenrock.
  • Grant Cemetery
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for the Grant Cemetery
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for the Grant Cemetery have been provided by the GNIS.<5> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to Find-A-Grave: FG ID #84033 <3>

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.<6>

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

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

  • Irvine
    (Less than 2 miles to the south)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Irvine have been provided by the GNIS.<5> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Irvine
    • Irvine is located in Converse County
  • Orin Junction
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the east)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Orin Junction have been provided by the GNIS.<5> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Orin Junction
    • Orin Junction is located in Converse County
  • Douglas
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
  • Bona
    (11 miles [17.7 km] to the east)
    • Note: The GPS coordinates that we are using for Bona have been provided by the GNIS.<5> The coordinates still need to be verified.
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bona
    • Bona is located in Converse County
  • Shawnee
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the east)
  • Glendo
    (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
  • Lost Springs
    (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
  • Keeline
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the east)
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Keeline
    • Keeline is located in Niobrara County
  • Boxelder
    (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Note: We haven't been able to verify our GPS coordinates for Boxelder. Although the coordinates have been estimated, they should be in the vicinity.<1>
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Boxelder
    • Boxelder is located in Converse County

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

Newspapers Published in Foster ...

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 12 newspapers that have been published in the area around Foster.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Foster, there are papers which were published within 28 miles [45.1 km]<4>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Foster.

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 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 Foster:

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

The official website for Converse County: www.conversecounty.org/

The official website for State of Wyoming: https://www.wyo.gov/

Footnotes ...

<1>An 'estimated' location is one where we have been given GPS coordinates, but are unable to verify the accuracy of those coordinates. That said, we have some confidence that we have placed the marker near the actual location. A typical reason for being unable to verify a location is that it might be on private property or maybe historic and gone without an obvious trace.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<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>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- Foster) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Foster. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 42.6730, Longitude: -105.3080       In this case, the coordinates for Foster have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>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.
<6>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 Foster, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.




 

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This page was last modified/updated: 29 Apr 2025