If you compared all the censuses between 1920 and 1950, you would see similarities and differences in the information collected. Generally, having consistent questions from one census to the next provided a benchmark to measure change. For this reason, most questions (such as age and sex) appeared on all censuses. However, new concerns could generate interest in new questions or approaches. For example, the Census Bureau added more economic questions to the 1940 census to understand the effects of the Great Depression. Ultimately, understanding what did or didn’t change can help focus your research.
Short-lived questions: Some census questions came and went quickly. For example, the 1930 census asked (for the first and last time) if the home had a radio. Nevertheless, details like this in the census can help you imagine a Veteran’s everyday life.
Farm Security Administration (FSA) client John Frost and his daughter listening to the radio in their home in Tehama County, California, November 1940. (Library of Congress)
Birthplace: Between 1880 and 1930, the census recorded the birthplace (e.g., state, territory, or country) for each person and their parents. Starting in 1940, the census stopped asking about parents—except for the randomly selected people who answered supplementary questions.
Why does parents’ birthplace matter? If you can trace a Veteran back to the 1930 census, you are much more likely to learn something about their family’s immigration story.
Entries for parents’ birthplace in 1930 Census Population Schedule for Seattle, Washington. Enumeration District 17-59, Sheet 10A.
In the previous lesson, we touched on the puzzle of two records potentially describing the same person but differing on a key detail. You might encounter this issue if two records have different ways of classifying something.
For example, the Census Bureau changed how it defined certain racial categories between 1930 and 1950. In 1930, “Mexican” was its own designated racial category while the 1940 census instructions noted: “Mexicans are to be returned as white, unless definitely of Indian or other nonwhite race.” In other words, the same person might have had their race described differently in the 1930 and 1940 censuses. This is a good illustration of how race was not a static, unchanging idea. Rather people and organizations defined and reinterpreted it over time.
Below are the 1930 instructions to census takers, specifically the section focused on how to classify race. You will note that classifying somebody’s race could often be an arbitrary and convoluted exercise, especially when a person’s parents had different racial backgrounds. Click the annotations to see how the instructions changed or remained the same over the next two decades.
Please be aware that you may find this content upsetting.
150. Column 12. Color or race.—Write “W” for white; “Neg” for Negro; “Mex” for Mexican; “In” for Indian; “Ch” for Chinese; “Jp” for Japanese; “Fil” for Filipino; “Hin” for Hindu; and “Kor” for Korean. For a person of any other race, write the race in full.
151. Negroes.—A person of mixed white and Negro blood should be returned as a Negro, no matter how small the percentage of Negro blood. Both black and mulatto persons are to be returned as Negroes, without distinction. A person of mixed Indian and Negro blood should be returned a Negro, unless the Indian blood predominates and the status as an Indian is generally accepted in the community.
152. Indians.—A person of mixed white and Indian blood should be returned as Indian, except where the percentage of Indian blood is very small, or where he is regarded as a white person by those in the community where he lives. . . .
153. For a person reported as Indian in column 12, report is to be made in column 19 as to whether “full blood” or “mixed blood,” and in column 20 the name of the tribe is to be reported. For Indians, columns 19 and 20 are thus to be used to indicate the degree of Indian blood and the tribe, instead of the birthplace of father and mother.
154. Mexicans.—Practically all Mexican laborers are of a racial mixture difficult to classify, though usually well recognized in the localities where they are found. In order to obtain separate figures for this racial group, it has been decided that all persons born in Mexico, or having parents born in Mexico, who are not definitely white, Negro, Indian, Chinese, or Japanese, should be returned as Mexican (“Mex”).
155. Other mixed races.—Any mixture of white and nonwhite should be reported according to the nonwhite parent. Mixtures of colored races should be reported according to the race of the father, except Negro-Indian (see par. 151).
-Bureau of the Census, Instructions to Enumerators: Population and Agriculture (Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1930), p. 26.
We are researching an Army Veteran named Joseph Olivera Quintero. We have found him in the 1950 Census in Albuquerque, New Mexico, working as a “Surgical Technician” in a “Veterans House.” Here he is listed on row 4. We have also found a 1930 Census for Fort Worth, Texas, that we think may feature Joseph (as “Jose”) on row 26.
Joseph O. Quintero in 1950 Census Population Schedule for Albuquerque, New Mexico. Enumeration District 1-4, Sheet 77, Row 4.
Jose Quintero in 1930 Census Population Schedule for Fort Worth, Texas. Enumeration District 220-41, Sheet 35A, Row 26.