2018-10-30

How I research U.S. Census enumerations

It can be sometimes easy or sometimes frustrating to find a person in the U.S. Censuses. But it's a valuable tool to understand more about an ancestor, if their enumeration is found in one or more censuses.

Background


Three types of censuses are available for researchng .
  • Most member states of the USA conduct State Censuses on a regular basis. The exceptions are Idaho, Kentucky, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and West Virginia. The variety of data collected varied with the state and the year. 
 

Availability 

Copies of many state censuses are on microfilm at the Family History Library of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The Family History Library's most complete collections of state censuses are for Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin. The Family History Library has provided most censuses as a set of digital images with a searchable database.

Search the Indexes

The following links are to a search page to the digital indexes managed by the Family History Library. The general search page can also post census appearances, and a general search could be more useful if you hope to find several census appearances for one family group.

United States Census Indices

California Census Indices

Colorado Census Indices

  • 1875, Colorado.
  • 1885, Colorado.

Florida Census Indices

Illinois Census Indices

Iowa Census Indices

Kansas Census Indices

Massachusetts Census Indices 

Minnesota Census Indices

Nebraska Census Indices

New Jersey Census Indices

New York Census Indices

North Dakota Census Indices

Rhode Island Census Indices

  •  1885, Rhode Island.

South Dakota Census Indices

Wisconsin Census Indices


Browse the Images

The following links are to a contents page to the digital images managed by the Family History Library. The contents page lists the states that contributed to the enumeration of U.S. residents. Select a state to open a contents page that lists the counties or enumeration districts.
 

Organizing Your Census Search

If your family data is very up-to-date, you may need to search for only a few isolated census enumerations. But if you want to provide census data for a large number of people in your extended family, you may find this guide useful.
  1. Review your existing data on ancestors and place their family names as relevant searches for each census year available. Typically, this results in a "Long Table" that correlates each person's birth and death years with available censuses.
  2. Organize the "Long Table" into research groups:
    • Into geographic areas, if you want to research all the census information for each locality. This focus produces detail for a One-Place Study (Step 3).
    • Into family groups, if you want to research each family as a set for detail in a Family Study (Step 4). 
  3.  One-Place Study approach
    1. steps to be added.
  4. Family Study approach 
    1. steps to be added.

Searching Transcribed Data

Census records can have many errors, as three steps created the indexed census information. (First is the person who provides the information during the census. Ages and dates can be incorrectly remembered; spellings may not be accurate. Second is the person who writes down the information during the census. Often the errors made in this step are matters of spelling or legibility. Third is the person who transcribes the information to the index. The transcriber is furthest removed from the accurate information. In recognition of this fact, most transcription efforts include one or more reviews before placing the index online.) In one case, my great grandfather was Johann Mathias Kohn at his birth. He later called himself "John M Kohn" in America. However, his name was entered to the index as "John W Kaserly." The family name has been indexed in other censuses with other spellings too: "Cohen," "Kahn," and several others.

How can you use the search page to find such an erroneous entry? Start with the most specific information, and gradually make the search less specific. Or use different combinations of known information.
  • Search for the full, known name.
    • This step is most useful for relatively uncommon names that are spelled correctly. 
    • For a more common names, make the search more specific by providing a birth location and date. 
    • The familysearch.org search engine can return thousands of results, but the website allows only about 5000 results to be displayed.
    • The familysearch.org website allows you to select the display of 20, 50, or 75 results on each page.
    • You can edit the URL to display as many as 500 entries per page.
      1. Find the portion of the URL that reads "count=20".
      2. Change the number to a value 500 or less.
      3. Press [Enter]. It will take a bit longer for the results to display.
      4. After you've reviewed the results, use the [Next] button at the bottom of the page to go to the next page. Using the Next button instead of the page number buttons will display as many as 5000 results in successive pages.
  • Search for the full name in a specific state, county, or city.
  • Search for known variants of the full name. Given name: "John M," "John," "Matthew," and "J M" are four possibilities for the enumeration.
    At least in the familysearch.org search engine, "John" and "Johann" are automatically checked while searching for either variant of the name, similarly for variants of other names such as "Matthew" and "Mathias." 
  • Search for the family name plus an initial for the given name. Supply the initial as "J*" to post all names starting with J.
    The given name may have been incorrectly entered or illegible.
  • Search for the family name as an initial and asterisk. Supply the full first name or its initial.
    The family name may have been entered incorrectly or illegible. For this search, we assume that the first letter was correct and legible.
  • Search for the the first names of two persons known (or assumed) to be residing together.
    For example, enter the first name of the husband and the first name of his wife.
    In case the husband or wife has died before the census, try entering the name of child who is younger than about 20 and would likely be at home with the family.

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