U.S. Gov’t to Release Census Covering the Great Depression
- Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:40pm by
Billy Hallowell
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In this photo provided by the National Archives at College Park, an enumerator interviews a woman for the 1940 Census. Veiled in secrecy for 72 years because of privacy protections, the 1940 U.S. Census is the first historical federal decennial survey to be made available on the Internet initially rather than on microfilm. (AP Photo/National Archives at College Park)
NEW YORK (The Blaze/AP) — It was a decade when tens of millions of people in the U.S. experienced mass unemployment and social upheaval as the nation clawed its way out of the Great Depression and rumblings of global war were heard from abroad.
Now, intimate details of 132 million people who lived through the 1930s will be disclosed as the U.S. government releases the 1940 census on April 2 to the public for the first time after 72 years of privacy protection lapses.
Access to the records will be free and open to anyone on the Internet — but they will not be immediately name searchable.
For genealogists and family historians, the 1940 census release is the most important disclosure of ancestral secrets in a decade and could shake the branches of many family trees. Scholars expect the records to help draw a more pointillistic portrait of a transformative decade in American life.
Researchers might be able to follow the movement of refugees from war-torn Europe in the latter half of the 1930s; sketch out in more detail where 100,000 Japanese Americans interned during World War II were living before they were removed; and more fully trace the decades-long migration of blacks from the rural South to cities.
Henry Louis Gates Jr., a Harvard University professor and scholar of black history who has promoted the tracing of family ancestry through popular television shows, said the release of the records will be a “great contribution to American society.”
Gates, whose PBS series “Finding Your Roots” begins March 25, said the “goldmine” of 1940 records would add important layers of detail to an existing collection of opened census records dating to 1790.
“It’s such a rare gift,” he said of the public’s access to census records, “especially for people who believe that establishing their family trees is important for understanding their relationship to American democracy, the history of our country, and to a larger sense of themselves.”
Margo Anderson, a census historian, said the records could help answer questions about Japanese-Americans interned in camps after the outbreak of WWII.
“What we’ll be able to do now, which we really couldn’t do, is to take a look at what the Japanese-American community looked like on the eve of evacuation,” said Anderson, a professor of history and urban studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
More than 120,000 enumerators surveyed 132 million people for the Sixteenth Decennial Census – 21 million of whom are alive today in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
The survey contained 34 questions directed at all households, plus 16 supplemental questions asked of 5 percent of the population. New questions reflected the government’s intent on documenting the turbulent decade, by generating data on homelessness, migration, widespread unemployment, irregular salaries and fertility decline.
Some of the most contentious questions focused on personal income and were deemed so sensitive they were placed at the end of the survey. Less than 300,000 people opted to have their income responses sealed.
In part because of the need to overcome a growing reluctance by the American public to answer questionnaires and fears about some new questions, the bureau launched its biggest outreach and promotional campaign up to that time, according to records obtained at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park, N.Y.
It opened its first Division of Public Affairs to blanket the country with its message, reaching out to over 10,000 publications and recruiting public officials, clergy and business owners to promote it.
Movie studios were enlisted to encourage their film stars to participate, including Cesar Romero, who later played the Joker in the Batman television series. A photograph of President Franklin D. Roosevelt taking the census also was used for the campaign.
The bureau also hired the managing editor of “Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life” to galvanize support in the black community. However, studies in the 1940s revealed undercounts, including 13 percent of draft-age black men.
In a first for the National Archives and Records Administration, the nation’s recordkeeper plans to post the entire census on the Internet — its biggest digitization effort to date.
That might be unsurprising given that increasingly popular online ancestry services make vast amounts of genealogical data available. But for previous decennial census releases, researchers had to trek to NARA branches to crank through microfilm machines.
Still, finding a name in the 3.8 million digitized images won’t be as easy as a Google search: It could be at least six months after the release before a nationwide name index is created.
In the meantime, researchers will need an address to determine a census enumeration district — a way to carve up the map for surveying — to identify where someone lived and then browse the records.
Some experts said enthusiasm for the release could be dampened by the lack of a name index, especially for novices.
“It may very well frustrate the newcomers,” said Thomas Macentee, an industry analyst helping recruit volunteers for a name indexing effort sponsored in part by the Mormon-run FamilySearch.org. “It’s like showing up on Black Friday. If you really want that TV set, if you really want that census record, you are going to be ready to go and you are going to keep at it no matter what.”
Publicly-traded Ancestry.com, which has over 1.7 million customers, is also working to make the census records searchable by indexing almost all fields and providing proprietary tools to mine the data.
Josh Hanna, a senior adviser for the company, said the 1940 census will be the biggest database of its kind. “It‘ll be the deepest level of indexing we’ve ever done,” he said. Access to the index and tools will be available for free through the end of 2013.
Other individuals and organizations across the country are also working to ease the use of the records, including the New York Public Library, which is digitizing the full set of New York City’s 1940 telephone books to help people locate addresses.
The 1940 U.S. Census Community Project, intended to assist in indexing the census, is being sponsored by a number of private, ancestry-related companies. Here’s a description of what the group is hoping to accomplish:
On April 2, 2012, NARA will make the 1940 U.S. Federal Census publicly available and indexing will begin shortly thereafter. Prior to that date, your society and the rest of the 1940 Community Project Team will recruit and train individuals to participate, with the goal of having a large volunteer community ready when the census is released. As the census is indexed, the 1940 Community Project Team will publish it state by state online, with free and open access.
A screen shot from the 1940 U.S. Census Community Project
Genealogy societies and libraries also have been holding packed workshops to educate their members.
In January, about three dozen people gathered in Manhattan for a meeting of the MetroNY Genealogy & Computers Special Interest Group to discuss the census. They included Michelle Novak, who has spent six years searching for information about her paternal grandfather, but has no street address to help locate him.
Novak, 43, said family members recalled him as a heavy drinker who worked long hours for the Pennsylvania Railroad and abandoned his family in the early 1930s.
But the few records she has been able to find include a signature in a railroad pension book. She believes the 1940 census might hold additional answers.
“If I can find one record, anything, it may help,” she said in an email after the meeting. “Even if I find him in jail or deceased, at least I will have an answer.”
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Copper Catfish
Posted on March 21, 2012 at 3:53pmAs a genealogist, I have been waiting for these records for 10 years! (They are released every 10 years, when the records are 72 years old.)
Report Post »These records are merely a list of WHO lived WHERE on a given date, according to county and state. It is a less-sophisticated version of Voter Vault.
It’s really fun to follow a family through the decades, especially when they are your own ancestors.
If you are really curious about past census records, you can find them at http://www.ancestry.com.
ThePostman
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 7:35amI am not even sure what they are talking about – I searched the 1930 census 30 years ago when I was doing geneology.
Report Post »MYHEROISRON
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 8:30amI have never participated in the census. I never will.
Report Post »Lesbian Packing Hollow Points
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 9:57amYou realize that the 1930 census would cover the roaring 20s and so show a prosperous American people, while the 1940 census would cover the 30s, the Great Depression decade, and so show a disastrous American people. This data dump will constitute the single greatest condemnation of Leftism, with the objective reality of what their policies cause, that there has ever been.
Report Post »Meyvn
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 6:08amThe Great Depression < The Coming Great Oppression
Report Post »BlackAce41
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 7:23amHistory is wrong when it talks about the great depression. It was not a world wide event as some may think. In other Countries the Economies where thriving. So if history is to repeat itself as our Economy dies others are thriving off our failure
Report Post »FlowerBell
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 1:03amPutting the issue of the census aside and focusing on the photo I see that one little boy in the picture sure has a lot of sisters to look after him, lucky kid. And these folks appear to be poor having simple cement blocks for a front step, yet they appear clean and mannerly. What has happened to poor people since then? Most are poor now because they are too lazy to work.
Report Post »There is a big difference between being poor and being lazy. The woman in the picture was not lazy. I’ll bet a dollar she made all the clothes her children are wearing. She was too busy to smoke crack, get her nails and hair done or spend all day on a cell phone. The entire concept of being poor in our country is warped beyond reason. Does the census show us that? The photo sure does.
Brooke Lorren
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 5:21amNot everybody who is poor is lazy. I happen to be temporarily “income deficient” yet I run my own business and homeschool my kids. My husband is in law school and also helps at a business that he helped start. We used to have a six-figure salary, yet we are temporarily one of the families living below the poverty level.
I have some other friends that probably live below the poverty level (I haven’t asked their income, but they have 9 kids so the poverty level for their family is $50,777 and they’re not rich). The dad works full time and the mom homeschools her kids too. I know for a fact that the mom doesn’t sit around on her cell phone and get her nails done all day; they barely leave the house except to go to church.
Do we have poor people who are lazy? Yes. But there are many “poor” people who are working hard or looking for jobs. I see these people at my church all the time.
Report Post »FlowerBell
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 5:57amObviously I was not referring to you. Good luck with your efforts in the future. God bless you.
Report Post »ColoradoMaverick
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 1:47pmPoor is a state of mind. Poor people by todays standards would be wealthy in any time period before the 1980′s. Poor people in American are wealthy by the standards of 90% of the rest of the world.
Report Post »Most poor people in this country are poor because they lack ambition, work ethic and and just plain lazy. Some people are poor because they fell on hard times, lost their jobs or had medical issues. I don’t worry about them, they will pull themselves up, unless they fall into the government dependence trap Obama is laying out for them.
babylonvi
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 12:06amGee, you don‘t think that great socialist FDR might have had the data ’sanitized’, do you?
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 2:46amHis Mind was Twisted… as his Body!
Report Post »Wakeup Maggie
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:38pmIs this suppose to make us feel better about our dismal situation? Watch what the other hand is doing
Report Post »woodyb
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 12:30amYes, we will all recognize what a terrific job OBOZO is doing with the economy!!!!!!!!!!!!
Report Post »Brooke Lorren
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 5:23amThey release the census every 10 years. I remember when the 1930 census came out in 2002.
Report Post »Rowgue
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:37pmWho cares. It‘s not like you’re going to learn anything by looking at census data. We already know there was a massive depression and a massive amount of people without jobs and struggling simply to survive. Specific numbers aren’t going to change anything.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:04pmDo you know what happens when there is no place to go for the beloved land, because there is no place in the earth, and all the land is full? People die by the billions.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:18pmThat’s the problem with wicked people they think the Bible is some damn joke to control people. No it’s not and that why Prophets continually warn people to not fill up the land, but they use the words “Don’t leave yourself no where to go.” But see they did seal up all places with no where for the beloved land to go. Because Jerusalem isn’t Jerusalem.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:27pmWith this warm winter in the U.S there is going to be a horrendous mosquito problem this spring and summer.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:30pmI’m not worried about big government at all, because there is bigger government coming.
Report Post »Psychosis
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:46pmdude TAKE YOUR RITALIN
you bounce around more than a beach ball at a sorority spring break
and on top of that, your just plain nuts
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 2:53amThis Country is filled with Delta types (Explorers, Risk Takers, and the Brave [of immigrants])… and if there was some place worth going, we would have gone… alike the Moon. So, we will have to make our Stand, here!
Report Post »HorseCrazy
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 10:01amor lukew we could ship off to newts moon colony…oh well a stand here it shall be
Report Post »ksmike
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:03pmBy the way, folks, this is not part of a greater invasion-of-privacy conspiracy. Don’t be so paranoid. Get a life.
It is actually pretty cool to be able to research a grandparent who is long since deceased and realize that when that information was taken, that 4-year-old girl in that family grew up, married your grandfather, gave birth to your dad and now you are here. It is like a snapshot in time. They become a lot more real to you–a great experience.
Report Post »Brooke Lorren
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 5:32amAll of my grandparents were alive for this census, so it will be pretty cool to see this one. I was talking to my grandma over the Christmas holiday, and she told me that her dad had been in the military but got out right before the great depression hit (she had never told me this before). It will be interesting to get a glimpse into their world back then.
My grandma taught me the word “frugal” as a kid, and I think that all comes from the experiences that she had as a kid. Frugality paid off for her; she now has plenty of money, although she still is very careful with her spending.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:59pmHere’s the only census that matters: there’s too many people in the world. But I see the good Lord is working on that as nations are plagued globally.
Report Post »Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:59pmWow, the Govt works at such speed. I bet it was lost in the mail all these years.
Report Post »Exiled
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 4:58amNot a matter of government speed. They were not legally allowed to release it until now.
Report Post »ksmike
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:58pmIf you want to be a part of the tens of thousands involved in indexing this project, making it readily searchable for everyone, you can sign on at https://www.familysearch.org/volunteer/indexing. Be careful, though. It can be addicting.
Report Post »Brooke Lorren
Posted on March 20, 2012 at 5:37amThanks for the link. I’ve benefited in the past from the efforts of volunteers; it would be nice to pay it forward a little.
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:58pmWhat a nice… Free… Society… that we have built!
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:22pmWell it’s going to be free after several plagues sweep around the world.
Report Post »spirited
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:55pmAnother tracking-device tool; under the guise of family reconnections and tracing history’s “roots”.
Nothing will be private; except perhaps Obama’s records.
>Unless he’s just another “useful idiot”.
Report Post »SpeckledPup
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:53pmthe BEST census would be the 1890, destroyed by fire. that silent 1880-1900 void stretches out like the Great Unknown.
Report Post »Netsurfer2
Posted on March 19, 2012 at 10:52pmAnd to think this is just the beginning of what we are going through! Now we have to also worry about another world war! I saw on the news that Russia is in Syria! I’m sure everyone wants a stake somewhere near there! It’s just a matter of time they get into each others way and then you have it!
I’m sure the world will be burned one way or another!
Report Post »