User:Kmnwestbye/Sandbox Iowa

Online Gazetteers

 * FamilySearch Places
 * Iowa Gazetteer
 * Wikipedia List of Iowa Townships
 * Iowa Hometown Locator
 * Iowa as it is in 1856 Nathan Howe Parker. Iowa as it is in 1856; a gazetteer for citizens, and a hand-book for immigrants, embracing a full description of the state of Iowa. Chicago, Ill. : Keen & Lee 1856
 * The western tourist and emigrant's guide J H Colton & J C Smith. The Western Tourist and Emigrant's Guide : With a compendious gazetteer of the states of Ohio... and Iowa, being an accurate and concise description of each state, territory and county, and an alphabetical arrangement of every city, town, post village or hamlet ... Also, describing all the principal stage routs, canals, rail-roads, and the distances between the towns. Accompanied with a correct map, showing the lines of the United States' surveys. New York : J.H. Colton 1840
 * Iowa State Gazetteer and Business Directory R L Polk & Co. Iowa State Gazetteer and Business Directory 1918-1919. Des Moines [Iowa] : R.L. Polk & Co.

Print Only Gazetteers

 * Iowa State Gazetteer James T Hair. Iowa State Gazetteer. Chicago, Illinois : Bailey & Hair, 1865
 * Abandoned towns, villages and post offices of Iowa David C Mott. Abandoned Towns, Villages and Post Offices of Iowa. Council Bluffs, Iowa : J. W. Hoffman & S. L. Purington Pub., 1973
 * Postmarked Iowa : a list of discontinued and renamed post offices Guy Reed Ramsey. Postmarked Iowa : A List of Discontinued and Renamed Post Offices. Crete, Nebraska : J-B Publishing, c1976
 * A Dictionary of Iowa Name-Places Tom Savage. A Dictionary of Iowa Name-Places. Iowa City, Iowa : University of Iowa Press, c2007

Why Use Gazetteers
A gazetteer is a dictionary of place-names. Gazetteers list or describe towns and villages, parishes, states, populations, rivers and mountains, and other geographical features. They usually include only the names of places that existed at the time the gazetteer was published. Within a specific geographical area, the place-names are listed in alphabetical order, similar to a dictionary. You can use a gazetteer to locate the places where your family lived and to determine the civil and religious jurisdictions over those places.

There are many places within a state with similar or identical place-names. You will need to use a gazetteer to identify the specific town where your ancestor lived, the state the town was or is in, and the jurisdictions where records about the person was kept.

Gazetteer Contents
Gazetteers may also provide additional information about towns, such as:


 * Different religious denominations
 * Schools, colleges, and universities
 * Major manufacturers, canals, docks, and railroad stations
 * The population size.
 * Boundaries of civil jurisdiction.
 * Ecclesiastical jurisdiction(s)
 * Longitude and latitude.
 * Distances and direction from other from cities.
 * Schools, colleges, and universities.
 * Denominations and number of churches.
 * Historical and biographical information on some individuals (usually high-ranking or famous individuals)