Ancestry.com has added an every-name index to the 1910 U.S. Federal Census. With this addition, Ancestry.com is the only place online where you can search every name in the fourteen publicly available decennial U.S. Federal Censuses.Â
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The every-name index will provide some distinct advantages over the old head-of-household index, the most obvious of which may be the ability to search for children, even when the head-of-household index (typically the father or mother) is unknown. In these instances, locating the child can take your research back an entire generation.
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It also opens up the possibility of searching for other family members, perhaps one with a more unusual given name. With surnames that have been misspelled in either the census itself, or the index, being able to search on any family member can make it easier to perform “given name only†searches. You can try using different family members, rotating in and out other information that can be used to narrow your search. Given name searches can also be helpful in locating women whose married names are unknown.
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Search the 1910 U.S. Federal Census online at Ancestry.com.
Search all decennial U.S. Federal Censuses online at Ancestry.com.
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And it looks liek it is possible for those Ancestry-deprived genealogists to browse the 1930 census for FREE for three days.
See my blog at http://randysmusings.blogspot.com for details.
Cheers — Randy Seaver
Perhaps there is something wrong with the search engine for the 1910 census. I could not get it to pull up anyone with the surname Anderson in the state of Georgia. I know they were there as I already have copies of the 1910 census for a bunch of them.
Apparently the 1910 index has been programmed to provide alternative spellings. In the past I have given great weight to the spelling corrections as they were provided by individuals with some knowledge of the subject. Now a computer is making erroneous assumptions. For example my father’s surname is Olive, shortened from Oliveira in 1866. All of his extended family in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties in California have been marked with the alternative spelling of Oliver.
Unfortunately, the search engine in the 1910 Census is not as user friendly as could be hoped. You can search on a name, but not on the combination of the name and either a location or a date. Sometimes, it will refuse to give any results for the combination of first and last name, but will give you that person when you search for last name and birth year only. At this rate, I just can’t be bothered to look for anyone. This database is less useable that it was before the addition of “every name”.
What is the problem? When will it be fixed? Does Ancestry even care? This has been a continuing problem since the database debuted last month.