1940 Census Continued

1940 Federal Census

1940 Federal Census Supplementary Questions

Some of the items that stuck out to me from Constance Potter's talk to the Montgomery County (MD) Historical Society Genealogy Club were:

• Remember this is a snapshot of the 1930's
• Enumeration Districts are smaller
• Look at all pages since the enumerators came back to find people and may have put them at the end of their report
• Column #25 asks why a person is not working. The answers are H: housework,  S: school, U: unable to work or Ot: other.  Other can be retired or those who didn't want to work.
• Wages/Salary: if working for themselves, nothing listed.  Also some folks didn't want to tell what they really made
• First census to have supplemental questions (only 5% were asked them)
• First census since 1870 that didn't ask about the Civil War
• Supplemental Question Column #48 "Has this woman been married more than once?"

I know Ms. Potter is speaking again at the Fairfax (VA) Genealogical Society meeting on 23 February 2012.  If you are in the Metro DC area, I HIGHLY recommend going.  Ms. Potter is an excellent speaker!!

And of course the National Archives Genealogy Fair will be held 18-19 April 2012 so I'm sure they will have at least one program on the 1940 Census!