Issue 41.10
In a quest to provide free online searchable indexes to all of the U.S. Censuses, FamilySearch indexing volunteers http://indexing.familysearch.org have recently started work on FamilySearch’s eighth U.S. Census index to add to its growing, free online collection http://pilot.familysearch.org —the 1930 U.S. Census. The 1930 U.S. Census is by far the most used of the U.S. Censuses, and the addition of a free, enhanced, fully searchable name index online will be highly treasured by genealogists. In addition, the new index will include other searchable data fields. FamilySearch has previously published the U.S. Censuses from 1850 to 1880 and from 1900 to 1920 online.
FamilySearch’s 1930 U.S. Census indexing project will have some noticeable differences from previous indexing projects. As you may know, FamilySearch’s approach to creating indexes is to do a “double key” entry and arbitrate discrepancies. That means that two different volunteers are indexing the same historic document. They create two separate indexes that will be compared, and any discrepancies will be arbitrated. The two indexes are then merged into a single, highly accurate, searchable index that is published online.
In the case of some of the U.S. Census indexing projects (including the 1910, 1920, and 1930 censuses), FamilySearch has used Ancestry.com’s index, and volunteers then created a separate index. The two indexes were then compared, all discrepancies were arbitrated, and an enhanced index was created and published online for free. The 1930 U.S. Census indexing project will be a little different from these projects because additional fields of data will be extracted, which will improve the patron search experience. Consequently, some volunteer indexers will download batches and will be asked to extract only the fields of information missing from Ancestry.com’s index, while those creating the B, or comparison, index will be required to index all of the fields. The result will be a much more comprehensible and enhanced free index for searching online.
In addition to the data already found in Ancestry.com’s current 1930 U.S. Census index, FamilySearch volunteers will also index the following fields:
· Line Number
· Family Number
· Gender
· Race
· Marital Status
· Father’s Place of Birth
· Mother’s Place of Birth
· Year of Immigration
Shanna Jones is a professional genealogist, now accepting new clients. For additional information, Shanna can be reached at (435) 628-4900 or shannasjones@msn.com.