Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Step Back Seventy-Two Years

Yes, the highly anticipated 1940 U.S. Federal Census arrived yesterday (April 2), seventy-two years after it was enumerated. Images of some states are available on Ancestry.com and FamilySearch.org, but indexing is still being done by thousands of volunteers.  I indexed several Delaware pages yesterday and have been working on Colorado today.

I remember well ten years ago when the 1930 census finally became available. It is so interesting to see the names of your grandparents, parents, uncles and aunts in the census transcript. It's fun to see where they were living and who their neighbors were.  Did they rent or own? What was their property worth?  How were they making a living? 

The 1940 census is much like the 1930 with two big differences. While asked for their own place of birth, in 1940 people were not asked to give the birth place of their parents as in very census since 1880 (this is very disappointing to me).  In 1940 people were asked where they lived in 1935 (this isn't very interesting to me). 

I began indexing records several months ago when my husband and I launched our Prison stint.  We are Family History Center volunteers for the Christ of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and travel to the Utah State Penitentiary to supervise and aid inmates while they are indexing records. The record images are then put on FamilySearch.org where the public can view them. Currently the inmates are indexing marriage records from various states and Italian vital records.  They are performing a magnificent service while they are serving time. I see it as part of their penance as they try to reform their hearts and minds.

Please view this short video which appeared on KSL's Mormon Times on Sunday, April 1, 2012 at 4:00 p.m. MDT.  It is a rare look into what some of the prisoners are doing with their time (they have to earn their visits).



Welcome to the Utah State Prison!

(I am truly surprised if anyone still visits this Blog! I've been inactive for so long.)

2 comments:

Family Attic said...

Thanks for posting the video, I really enjoyed it.

Nancy said...

Hey, it's nice to see a new post from you! I still read your blog when your post something new.

What a good thing you are doing at the prison. I hope the inmates appreciate it.