1950 US Census: Putting Reported Income In Context

When the 1950 US Census is released in April, it will have detailed information on a surprisingly large sample of the population.

One in five sampled

If I'm lucky, my ancestors will be among the 20% of people sampled, which meant they answered additional questions about 1949 full-year income and more.

My deep dive into the reported statistics about each state will give me good context for interpreting my ancestors' answers. (You can see each state's reported statistics in the publications at HathiTrust. There are so many fascinating tables of statistics, income and much more, on a state-by-state basis.) 

Apples-to-apples comparison 

As shown in the excerpt above, the median income for urban areas of New York state was $3,123*, higher than the median for the state overall. I would expect my Big Apple ancestors and other city-dwellers to report higher incomes than any who lived in rural areas. Common sense, but seeing the statistics in the official reports gives me a sense of how much people might have earned at that time, so I can compare with my father's income. 

In later life, when my mother occasionally talked about those post-war years, she said my father's travel agency was doing well. I won't know how well unless they were among the 20% of the population who answered those sample questions in the 1950 Census. 

Yes, I already have their Enumeration District listed so I can browse for them as soon as the Census is released in April.

*The 2021 equivalent of $3,123 in income would be more than $33,000. 

For Context of 1950 US Census, See Documents at HathiTrust

The release of the 1950 US Census is only 151 days away! 

On April 1, 2022, we will be able to browse the population schedule of the US Census that was taken on April 1, 1950. No indexing will be available on day 1, but we can click our way through 7.8 million pages of handwritten Census data about U.S. households, arranged by Enumeration District.

Preparing for the Census release means (1) listing ancestors we want to find, (2) locating a residential address for each ancestor, and (3) turning the address into an Enumeration District using the powerful Unified Census ED Finder tool from Steve Morse and Joel Weintraub. I describe the three-step process here.

In addition, so we can put our ancestors into context, it's a good idea to read some of the publications summarizing the background and results of the 1950 Census. 

HathiTrust has carefully curated a collection of nearly 200 documents related to the 1950 US Census. Take a look! 

WorldCat Search Tip: Author and Title

My aunt was a WAC during WWII and also the historian of her unit. I have a water-damaged copy of the book* she wrote, passed down in the family for decades. Still, I wanted to read an undamaged copy to be sure I had all the details correct.

Searching WorldCat

Off to WorldCat to search, I entered her name as author. I quickly discovered that a library not far away had a copy in the reference department. My librarian arranged an inter-library loan! I photographed key pages that are not in good condition in my personal copy, and returned the book with a thank-you to my library and another thank-you to the other library.

However, if I had searched using the title of the book, as well as the author, WorldCat would have shown me the above results. Notice the arrow, pointing to the ebook available with a single click?!

Yes, WorldCat included HathiTrust Digital Library in its search results, and there, for all the world to read (and/or download), is my aunt's History of the WAC Detachment, 9th Air Division, Sept 1942-Sept 1945. Professionally digitized and in great condition. Here's a link to the book.

Today's Search Tip

So today's tip is: remember to search WorldCat by author and title. Even if you know the author, as I did, be sure to search by title to see slightly different search results, including ebooks that may not pop up in an author-only search.

* These WAC histories were written and privately printed, paid for by members of the WAC detachments who chose to order a copy--in advance. My aunt purchased several copies, for family and for her good friend in the British intelligence service, a woman she met during her harrowing trans-Atlantic crossing in the midst of German sub threats.

The Fortune and the Mayflower

EVERYONE knows the name of the first ship from Europe to reach Massachusetts in 1620. But not everyone knows the name of the second ship, the Fortune, which arrived in November of 1621.

The Fortune is vitally important to my husband's family tree: young Thomas Cushman, a passenger on that second ship, later married my husband's Mayflower ancestor, Mary Allerton.

With Mayflower 2020 in mind, I've been doing a bit more research via the NEHGS and via the Hathitrust Digital Library, where there are more than 115,000 results for the phrase "Mayflower descendants" (as shown at top).

The four Pilgrim ancestors in my husband's family tree are:

• Degory Priest, who planned to send for wife Sarah Allerton Priest later, unfortunately didn't survive the first winter. 
• Isaac Allerton, whose first wife (out of three) was
• Mary Norris Allerton...unfortunately, she didn't survive the first winter.
• Mary Allerton, a daughter of Isaac and Mary, who lived into her 80s. Until she died on Nov. 28, 1699, she was known as the final surviving Mayflower passenger.

Wishing you all a happy and healthy Thanksgiving as my #52Ancestors "Thankful" prompt this week.

Tuesday's Tip: Searching Online Libraries

Yes, it's a long shot, but sometimes our ancestors are mentioned in books, especially books outlining specific family trees. So I've been taking a few minutes to plug surnames into the search boxes of online libraries--not just Heritage Quest--and see what I can find, with some success.

To avoid getting too many hits, I use the search phrase "surname AND genealogy" in this initial step to narrow things down, using whatever surname I'm researching at the time.

Next, I look at the listing of digitized books, select one or two that seem most promising, and search within the books for the surname.

Here are three online libraries to explore:

• HathiTrust Digital Library allows searching across its catalog and within individual books. Plugging in McClure, I found this page about the Halbert McClure family from Donegal to Botetourt, VA in a genealogy that covered not just McClure but also Haddon and Curry families. 
• Archive.org's "Free Books" section has a search box at the top left where I plugged in "McClure AND genealogy" and found 8 possible hits to explore. The most promising hit is A History of Rockbridge County, where Halbert McClure settled.
• Family Search's Family History Books will search across 80,000 books in family history libraries around the country. The search can be general or advanced. Searching simply for "McClure" turned up more than 4,000 entries! I switched to advanced search, added "Halbert" as a second search word, and got only 100 results. Not all of these books can be accessed digitally, however. The one I viewed was McClure Family Records.

Happy searching!