Go Census !!! Go
FamilySearch.org!!! Go Ancestry.com!!!
Digitizing the US
Federal Census put Ancestry.com on the map those many years ago.
Wonder if there
should there be a club of people who used microfilms for census research --
MCRers… ?
Ok, basic census
facts. The US Federal Census was taken
every 10 years on the even 10 years from 1790 to the latest taken in 2010. The next will be taken in 2020. The most recent census that can be examined
by genealogists (and anyone else) is the 1940 census. Each enumeration (again, great word) is held
private by the government for 72 years before being released/published.
72 was an arbitrary
number at the time, with the presumption that after 72 years, few people
enumerated would still be alive.
Surprise, surprise when in 2012 the 1940 census was released, and a
fairly large crowd could go "look, it's me." The 1940 census was also
notable because rather than being indexed by a firm with paid folk, it was
crowd indexed, and done in months.
Amazing.
For anyone looking
for ancestors who lived in the US, it is the second stop. (First is house documents; natch.) Questions asked in each census differ, but
the basic format is the same -- a heading detailing census year and geographic
boundaries of this piece of the whole, and also the name of the person who was
the census taker. Rows and columns below include names, ages, assets,
occupation, schooling, and on and on.
If you have an
ancestor who ever lived in the US, the basic assumption is that you, the
researcher, will work very hard and search very creatively to find every
ancestor on every census within their lifespan and residence in the US. Often comparing different census years tells
chapters in a story. Gent moves from electrician to manager to
owner of business through the course of 30 years.
And even if an
ancestor was only in the US for a short time, friends and relatives could have
been in the US longer, and….
The census is such a
big topic. Watch for Census Friday
during the next months ….
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
2018
begins with an "ABC-darium," a walk through the alphabet expanding
into short comments on matters genealogical. Published on Tuesday and
some Fridays, a letter may be visited more than once before moving
on.
Copyright
2018, SERoss