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I’ve tried to look at the data of this census. Whoever set up the web site should not be paid, what a cluster f*** of a site. Utter waste of tax payer money. Just about impossible to navigate, lots and lots of guess work and random jabs to……nothing. Terrible.
That's not true in the 1950 census. The census takers went back another time. One town I looked at had a total population of 156. 20 of them are on the last page, where the census taker went back. The first visits say "Not at Home". The last page has the house numbers that match the Not at Home lines.
I’ve tried to look at the data of this census. Whoever set up the web site should not be paid, what a cluster f*** of a site. Utter waste of tax payer money. Just about impossible to navigate, lots and lots of guess work and random jabs to……nothing. Terrible.
I just read that Ancestry is indexing it- who knows when that index will be available. Ancestry noted the first machine indexing was done by Univac which explains a lot!!!
It's a little clunky, but so far I have found my paternal great-grandfather and great-grandmother living with two of my grandmother's sisters. And I found my grandmother's brother with his family, all living in Brooklyn. I haven't found my maternal family easily and am not in the mood to wade through hundreds of Rosens in Manhattan, as I have a lot of other genealogical tasks on my plate right now.
Lord.. I can't imagine searching New York City.. I was searching Enoree, SC, which had a population of 655 in 2010.
And Abbeville, SC that had a population of 5300 in 1950.. And actually is slightly smaller today. More households, less people overall.. Which I think is another hallmark of change that the 1950 census starts to show. More households, but smaller households. The days of every other house having 10 kids starts to dial back.
Location: Chapel Hill, NC, formerly NoVA and Phila
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Labonte18
Lord.. I can't imagine searching New York City.. I was searching Enoree, SC, which had a population of 655 in 2010.
And Abbeville, SC that had a population of 5300 in 1950.. And actually is slightly smaller today. More households, less people overall.. Which I think is another hallmark of change that the 1950 census starts to show. More households, but smaller households. The days of every other house having 10 kids starts to dial back.
NYC is not fun! And it's where all of my direct ancestors (who came to the US) lived. My dad's families' names are a little more unique, but my mom's are Rosen and Rosenbaum. There are literally thousands of them in NYC. And most of them moved from tenement to tenement every few years. The one good thing about NYC is that there is a New York State Census through 1925.
A small town sounds lovely! I have a few collateral branches that lived in Omaha, El Paso, and St. Louis, which I enjoy researching.
I’ve tried to look at the data of this census. Whoever set up the web site should not be paid, what a cluster f*** of a site. Utter waste of tax payer money. Just about impossible to navigate, lots and lots of guess work and random jabs to……nothing. Terrible.
The National Archives made the microfilm available, as well as some metadata. It's not their role to perform the complete indexing. I haven't had any issues finding what I want there, even with the not so great machine indexing. Once Family Search and Ancestry get through the indexing, it will be far better, and simpler to search.
Location: Chapel Hill, NC, formerly NoVA and Phila
9,775 posts, read 15,776,851 times
Reputation: 10880
I found my mother and her parents! My 84-year old mother gave me her address in Manhattan, and I was able to look up the enumeration district and find it that way.
I just spent over an hour on the phone with her, while she told me stories about every family in the building. It was so cool! She remembered almost everyone. One family who lost a son in WW2, one family who sent their child to live out west because of asthma, the mean old woman who didn't speak to anyone, the girl who lived a floor below her who she played with a lot (as of a few years ago, they still sent Christmas cards to each other!), the women my grandmother used to sit in the park with, etc. It was history jumping off the page with her bringing every name to life!
The building is still standing (it was built in 1935). My mother lived in it from 1941 when she was 3 years old until about 1953 when she was in high school. She said she loved living there and got teary-eyed a few times. I wish I could have recorded it.
NYC is not fun! And it's where all of my direct ancestors (who came to the US) lived. My dad's families' names are a little more unique, but my mom's are Rosen and Rosenbaum. There are literally thousands of them in NYC. And most of them moved from tenement to tenement every few years. The one good thing about NYC is that there is a New York State Census through 1925.
A small town sounds lovely! I have a few collateral branches that lived in Omaha, El Paso, and St. Louis, which I enjoy researching.
Well.. There are other problems when it comes to small towns. My grandparents address is listed as 3 1/4 mile on right. I suppose that's from the center of town. So, rural areas didn't always have addresses. In fact, up until the 90's my grandmothers house was RR 2 Box 86.
So.. Different challenges with rural areas. However. At the end of the day. Far easier to go through 5000 people vs 10 million.
Quote:
Originally Posted by michgc
I found my mother and her parents! My 84-year old mother gave me her address in Manhattan, and I was able to look up the enumeration district and find it that way.
Ha. Tell her good on her for remembering the address where she lived 72 years ago. I can't remember what I had for dinner last night.
I’ve tried to look at the data of this census. Whoever set up the web site should not be paid, what a cluster f*** of a site. Utter waste of tax payer money. Just about impossible to navigate, lots and lots of guess work and random jabs to……nothing. Terrible.
Terrible to navigate for anyone looking for relatives in big cities because there is no name index and therefore it's really difficult to find people unless they have very unique names. For smaller places it is possible to find people. I am writing this based on my personal experienc.
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