See More of your Census Citation [Tuesday’s Tip]

One of the differences I noticed when I upgraded from Family Tree Maker 2010 to Family Tree Maker 2012 is that hovering over a source citation didn’t tell me as much as it used to – at least for census citations that I had let Family Tree Maker create after the upgrade.
Before:

After:


You’ll notice that the individual’s name was listed in the “before” example, but not in the “after” example.

To make things even more confusing, census citations generated in my Ancestry Member Tree and subsequently synched to Family Tree Maker showed the additional information.  What’s up with that?

This week, I finally figured it out!

Apparently the default for a certain little checkbox on the citation screen was changed between Family Tree Maker 2010 and 2012.  It used to default to Checked; now it defaults to Unchecked.


By checking this checkbox, I can now see the Citation Detail and the Citation Text when I hover over a citation.  This is very helpful for me.

I have issues with the lack of completeness in the auto-generated source citations from US Census records, but that’s for another day.  This is a Tip, not a Complaint.

Census Mistakes: Parent’s birthplace

We all know that there are mistakes in the census.  We complain about mangled names which make it difficult to find our ancestors.  We are confused by ages when the women seem to get younger with every passing 10 years.  I am always skeptical when I see conflicting birthplaces listed for parents, but I figure that a wife (who might have been the one giving the information) might not really know where her husband’s parents were born.  I consider them “hints” rather than “facts”.

In this example from District 16, Waco, McLennan County, Texas, in the 1930 census, the birthplaces of the parents are switched.


Since the people in this listing (L. Lloyd Edmonds and his 4 children) are lodgers, their relationship to each other is not indicated in the census.  However, I know that Amanda M., Lloyd Jr, Lee O., and Vivian are the children of the widower.  (I also know that they spelled Loyd with one L rather than two.)

You will note that the father’s place of birth is listed as Texas, but the place of birth of father on each of the children’s lines is listed as Tennessee.  If you took this at face value, you would think that Loyd might be an uncle rather than the father of these 4 children.  However, the birthplace of the mother is listed as Texas.  In reality, the two columns (birthplace of father and birthplace of mother) are swapped.  Their deceased mother was born in Tennessee.

This makes one wonder if the entire page is similarly transposed, or possibly every page completed by this particular enumerator.

This is just one more thing that we have to be on the lookout for.

Watch Out: Census Pages Out of Order

I recently found the following census index listing on ancestry.com:



It seemed very odd to have 6 young Appling children living with Melton Keesmon. 

The first Appling I found here was Aretha.  Since I was looking for Althea/Aletha, I first assumed that this was not the person I was looking for.  Then I realized that Nancy, John, Americus, and Oscar were siblings of Aletha, as listed in the 1860 census.  Hmmm. Seems like the right family.  But what’s with the head of household Melton Keesmon?

Since the children’s father was William Burrell Appling, I looked at his 1850 census listing.  I found him with his wife and 4 children, ages 14 through 21.  But who are Isabella and Eliza King?



The answer to both mysteries comes from realizing that the pages are out of order.

Melton Keesman is listed in family # 690 at the bottom of image 100 .

Burrell Appling, with his family # 717 is listed at the bottom of image 104.

The Appling children (Nancy, Cordelia, John, Americus, Oscar, Aretha) are listed at the top of image 101 with no family number.  However, the family immediately following them is numbered 718.

Similarly, the King children (Isabella and Eliza) are listed at the top of image 105 with no family number.  The family immediately following them is numbered 743, so presumably they are part of family # 742.

Mystery solved:  image 101 should follow image 104.  This is one more reason to look past the index and review the scanned document, especially when the information provided in the index seems a little fishy.

Marriage Hints in the US Census

Censuses are commonly used to find names, birth years, occupations, and family members.  How much do you use them for marriage information?

1850 Census

The 1850 Census, the first to list people other than the head of household, contains an often overlooked bit of information.  Column 10 asks whether the individual was married within the year.

The following example shows that David S Woollery and Caroline were married during 1850.
The enumerator’s instructions do not say whether “within the year” means the calendar year or the last 12 months.  Either way, it gets you close.

The marriage information can also give a hint to a second marriage.  In the following example, the apparent parents (Wm B Field and Mary Field) were married within the past year, but there are several older children living in the household.

1860 Census

The information in the 1860 Census is similar to that of the 1850 Census.  Column 11 indicates whether the individual was married within the year.

In the following example, the 22-year-old John H Gilbert and his 15-year-old wife Sarah J Gilbert were married in 1860, and were living in the household of Isaac Dickens.  It is logical to guess that Isaac Dickens (age 39) may be Sarah’s father; her maiden name might be Dickens.

1870 Census

The 1870 Census brought a slightly different twist on the question of whether or not the respondent was married within the year.  Instead of a tick mark, the enumerator was asked to record the month (Column 14).  This is an improvement!

In this example, the physician Mick Curtis and his wife Sue were married in May of 1870.

1880 Census

After a brief step forward to include the month of marriage, the 1880 Census again only includes a tick mark to indicate whether or not a couple was married within the year (Column 12).  In a stroke of inefficiency, this census uses tick marks and three columns to indicate marital status (Column 9 for Single, Column 10 for Married, and Column 11 for Widowed/Divorced).

Interestingly, people often weren’t marked as “Married” if they were “Married within the year”.

In the following example, Willis C Grider was living with his new bride, Laura E, in the house of Willis’s parents, Waitsville and Sabrina Grider.

1890 Census

We usually skip over the 1890 Census since so little of it still exists.  However, for those who are fortunate enough to find pertinent surviving records, there are some marriage tidbits.

The 1890 Census is arranged very differently that what we are used to, as you can see.

In this example Leanna T Hughes (Person 11 of the family) is listed as a daughter-in-law of the head of household (Row 3) and is listed as married (Row 7) and married between June 1, 1889 and May 31, 1890 (Row 8).  Her husband, Erasmus D Hughes, isn’t listed on the same page, or even adjacent (Person 3 of the family) but you can tell that he is most likely her husband because his entry also lists him as married within the year.

1900 Census

The 1900 Census is the first census that we typically think of as having useful marriage information.  Column 9 shows Marital Status; Column 10 shows the number of years married.  With a little simple math, you can figure out the year in which the couple was married.

In this example,George W Barie is shown as 42 years old and had been married for 10 years.  Tina Barie was 26 years old and had also been married for 10 years.

The math:
1900 (year of the census) minus 10 years = 1890

George and Tina were married in 1890.

1910 Census

The information in the 1910 Census is similar to that in the 1900 Census.  Column 8 shows the marital status, and Column 9 indicates the number of years of the present marriage. 

In this example, K.H. Parker is 55 and married for 32 years.  His wife Emanda B Parker is 52 and also married for 32 years. You’ll also note that this enumerator has listed “M1” as the marital status, indicating that this was the first marriage for both K.H. and Emanda B. Parker.

The math:
1910 (year of the census) minus 32 years = 1878

K.H. and Emanda B. Parker were married in 1878.

1920 Census

Sadly, the 1920 Census shows only marital status and relationship to the head of household. There is nothing to indicate when a couple was married.

1930 Census

There are several pieces of information in the 1930 census that can be pieced together to reveal a marriage year:  Marital condition (column 14), Age at first marriage (column 15), Age at last birthday (column 13), and Relationship to head of household (column 6).  Unfortunately, it requires a little more math than some of the other censuses.

Consider this example:
A. B. Collins was 68 when the 1930 census was taken and married.  He was 23 when first married.  His wife, Mandie J Collins, was 70 and had been 25 when first married.

The math:
68 years old minus 23 years old = 45 years ago
70 years old minus 25 years old = 45 years ago

Since they match, there’s a good chance that they were married to each other.

Now, to find the marriage year:
1930 (year of the census) minus 45 years = 1885

A.B. and Mandie J Collins were married in 1885.  I happen to know that this is correct because I also have copies of Family Bible pages that show that A.B. Collins and Amanda Jane Perryman (Mandie) were married on July 30, 1885.  The math works!  Try it.

1940 Census

The 1940 Census is not yet available to the public due to the 72-year privacy rule; however, blank forms are available for review.  This census takes another step backward in marriage information.  It lists Marital Status (Column 12) but no other information directly related to a marriage.

You can do your own census research

Archives.com has just announced that it now offers the complete United States Census collection (1790 through 1930).  Check it out at www.archives.com/census.