Author Archives: Dawn Bingaman

1940 Census Indexing Update

Posted on by
Reply

The Genealogy Insider blog by Diane Haddad on April 10th gave us a nice update on 1940 census indexing to date by various entities. I was intrigued by the beautiful map on the FamilySearch.org 1940 census page, showing percent completion of indexing efforts state by state. Place your cursor on any state to view how much of that state’s census has been indexed. Below, you’ll see that 92% of the 1940 census for Kansas has been indexed  by volunteers in the ten days since the census was released. Amazing effort!

Map of U.S. showing census indexing efforts to date

It is important to remember that this map represents indexing efforts of one group only. If you don’t find your state represented, check out some of the other links in Haddad’s blog to see what has been done by other groups. Join the volunteer indexing effort at https://the1940census.com/getting-started/.

Another Infographic About the Release of the 1940 Census

Posted on by
Reply

If you’re interested in statistics about the public launch of the 1940 United States Federal Census, or you’re just a data nerd in general, you’ll find this infographic released by Archives.com to be an interesting glimpse behind the scenes. The first digital release of the census was clearly a massive undertaking, with wide-spread public appeal.1940 census archives.com

1940 Census Launch

Posted on by
Reply

The April 2nd launch of the 1940 United States Federal Census generated a great deal of excitement among genealogists, history buffs, and the merely curious alike. And while I didn’t queue up outside of the Seattle regional branch of the National Archives (ahem) like some, I did sit down with my laptop at 7:30 a.m. PDT, roughly 90 minutes after the census was officially made available to the public at large. This was my first look at ED 40-31 for Shoshone Co., Idaho.

1940 Census: Preparing page

Later that same evening, after the East Coasters should have been tucked into bed, my view still hadn’t changed. Fortunately, the technical issues were resolved when I checked back 24 hours later. So far, I’ve found the site to be relatively easy to navigate, although buttons to minimize and maximize the census image would be a nice addition.

You can use the CTRL key plus the plus sign (Ctrl++) on your keyboard to maximize, or the CTRL key plus the minus sign (Ctrl +-) to minimize, but this will increase/decrease the size of your entire browser window. I find that to be a small inconvenience for FREE access to all 1940 census images.

Visit the official website of the 1940 census at  http://1940census.archives.gov.

Official 1940 Census websiteThe Official 1940 Census website page