Ed. note: Once each decade, the Census Bureau releases the individual records of an official Census taken 72 years earlier. Today, it released the 1940 Census, giving historians and genealogists an additional ten years of detailed information about our nation, as well as our ancestors and relatives.
To mark the occasion, U.S. Census Bureau Director Robert M. Groves posted the following on The Commerce Blog:
On April 2, 2012 the Census Bureau did something unique, a once-in-a-decade action. Throughout all other times, we focus on keeping confidential the social and economic data that households and businesses provide us. Once every decade we release the individual records of a 72-year old census. This year it was the 1940 Census.
Approaching that day, the buzz in the genealogy world was deafening; they have been waiting 10 years to fill in their family trees, to learn new things about their ancestors, and to expand their insight into their lives.
As the genealogist of my family I can’t wait to look up my grandparents, aunts, and uncles, as well as my parents’ forms. The forms won’t be indexed by name immediately, so we’ll have to link addresses of our ancestors to enumeration districts and then browse the enumeration district looking for our relatives. Right now, my tracking of the Groves’ family goes back to 1670 on the Isle of Wight, off the coast of England, but it ends in 1930. The 1940 Census allows me to see records of people I remember meeting in my youth.
Fonte: White House