Welcome to Madison County IAGenWeb

Madison County is located in the south central part of Iowa. It was established in 1846 and organized in 1849 from a territory within Mahaska County. Madison County has many covered bridges made famous in the book The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller. It is also the birthplace of John Wayne and the home of the tree that produced the first "Delicious" apple.  

Daily Updates:  The County Coordinator and several members of the Madison County Genealogical Society are working daily on obituaries, cemetery records, marriage records, birth records, gravestone photos, newspaper gleanings, the Madison County Family Tree, and other research pertaining to Madison County. If you visited this website before and didn't find your relative's information, we urge you to look again. 

This list is a sample of what has been added from April 2023 thru September 2023.   Additional details are provided in the next section.

• Obituaries - 370 new, both recent and found from previous years
• Marriages - 99 marriages took place in Madison County in 1922
• Church Histories - 88 known Madison County churches established since 1846
• Row locations - 16,000 row links have been added to Iowa Gravestone Photo Project records to assist in locating the actual grave
• Cemetery Burials -  Reflecting the most recent interments
• Family Tree - Constant growth with new leaves and whole branches

New Data Sets and Major Additions:  Below is a description of additional, complete data sets added (the first six) plus major updates to ongoing projects, done between October 2022 and September 2023. 

1922 Madison County Births: The complete set of Madison County births for calendar year 1922, comprised of 291 records, have been posted to our birth pages as of Jan 3, 2023. To see the list of 1922 births, click here. To see them integrated with all births, select BIRTH RECORDS on the left.  (Posted 03 Jan 2023) 

Random Birth Records: As a part of routine maintenance of the website as well as special projects, we may run across Madison County births not found in the official birth records that either haven't been included or for which additional information has been uncovered. They may come from other county's state census records, marriage records, obituaries, death records, Social Security Applications or Draft Registrations. These random records or record changes are accumulated and posted to the website every 6 months. Birth records accumulated in the 6 months ending 30 Sep 2023 have been integrated into our Birth records and also posted here as a separate list. (Posted 30 Sep 2023).

1922 Madison County Marriages: The complete set of Madison County marriages for calendar year 1922, comprised of 198 records, have been posted to our MARRIAGE RECORDS as of September 30, 2023. To see the list of 1922 marriages, click here.  To see them integrated with all marriages, select MARRIAGE RECORDS on the left. (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Census Supplements: A Census Supplements section has been added to the CENSUS RECORDS page and contains two new datasets.  Though not a complete list of all those who were living here, they provide a snapshot of specific individuals that may help you place your family in Madison County.  They are the 1878 Madison County Farmers by Post Office and the more extensive Madison County 1892 Farmers by Post Office, which is of value since no 1890 Federal Census records exist for Madison County. (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Madison County Church Histories: Extensive work was done to create a complete list of 88 known churches since the settlement of Madison County, with historical information found for all but five. This project included determining church locations, summarizing their histories, and digging for photos.  If possible, names of early members are included for genealogical purposes. Each church has one or more sources for further research. You can access the histories at the CHURCHES in the menu to the left. (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Winterset News Obituaries: Most of the older obituaries on line came from a collection of clippings from the Winterset Madisonian held by the Winterset Library. With the recent availability of all Madison County newspapers on line, we initiated a project in April 2022 to glean the Winterset News (1873-1945) of obituaries not found in the Madisonian as well as obituaries with significantly new information. The former were posted as new obituaries and the latter were appended to the existing obituaries. This multi-year project was completed on 25 Aug 2023. A total of 431 new obituaries were posted and 907 were appended to existing obituaries. (Posted 25 Aug 2023)

Ongoing Projects:  Several efforts require work over multiple years to complete or to maintain constant updates.

Gravestone Photos: Over 30,600 gravestones in Madison County's 55 cemeteries have been photographed and posted at the Iowa Gravestones Project. This is a continuous effort as there are new burials, repaired gravestones, or stones placed on existing graves. In the period 01 Apr 2023 to 30 Sep 2023, 198 gravestones have been photographed, with GPS coordinates, and posted. A list of the new postings can be seen in a separately compiled list of new Gravestone Photo postings. (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Enhanced Gravestone Way-finding: To help those who want to personally visit family members' gravestones in a Madison County cemetery, a project is underway to add a link with the row number, as well as section letter for larger cemeteries, to the gravestone photo.  This link will take you to a cemetery map with the rows marked.  Using this information, a visitor can walk to the row then use the gravestone photo to locate a stone.  Please note that rows are often incomplete or irregular, so searching neighboring rows is suggested.  See a sample here. Over 16,000 gravestones records have been updated with a row link. (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Civil War Gravestone Project: With collaboration among the Madison County IAGenWeb team and the Madison County Genealogy Society, volunteers are researching and procuring Veterans Administration (VA) issued gravestones for Civil War soldiers currently lying in unmarked graves in Madison County cemeteries. Veterans of other pre-WWI conflicts were added to the project in early 2023 and as of 31 Oct 2023, 22 new stones have been placed and 2 repaired. Photographs of the gravestones already placed can be seen here. 

Iowa Veterans Cemetery: Thanks to a volunteer within the IAGenWeb community, the CEMETERIES page now contains a link, with continual updates, to Madison County individuals buried in the Iowa Veterans Cemetery just outside of Van Meter. (Posted 30 Mar 2023)

Surname List of Madison County Gravestones: Under construction  More information to come.  (Posted 21 Nov 2023) 

Madison County Family Tree: Our online tree holds over 100,700 individuals, grouped in families, who have a direct connection to Madison County (without ancestors and descendants who do not). Continual updates are made from various sources, such as additions to this website, vital records encountered in our research, and incoming obituaries.  When first generated, the tree had few sources. For the past five years, we have been entering sources for all new entries and, as we have occasion to work with older entries, adding sources for them as well.   (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

Current Contributors:  Maintenance and improvement of this website would be impossible without the continued support of various volunteer contributors. Those below are especially dedicated to their work and have our deep appreciation.  (Posted 30 Sep 2023)

• Special thanks go to Pat Hochstetler and Shirley Keating who have worked tirelessly in transcribing new obituaries weekly along with older obituaries as they are found. 
  
  
• During 2022, a variety of local genealogists, led by Pat Hochstetler, volunteered their time in cemeteries to gather data and to add photos for the Iowa Gravestones Project for Madison County.  Pat then updates both row-by-row and alphabetical listing documents, which are available at the Winterset Public Library. 
  
  
• Colleen Peterson has put much energy into the Civil War Gravestone Project, researching candidates, creating VA applications, communicating with cemetery trustees, coordinating installations, and inviting descendants, if known.
  
  
• Kent Transier, although retired from active County Coordinator duties, continues to expand the website with new/additional information in many categories or to connect information within the website.  Recent examples include the Civil War Gravestone Project, creating cemetery maps with rows in support of the Iowa Gravestone Photo Project, Winterset News obituaries, census supplements, and the extensive Church History information.