By: Angela L. Ramsey (27 February 2017)

Are you searching frantically for that 1890 census record that proves great-grandma’s lineage? Sadly, I’d like to say search no further, but it’s pretty much impossible to find these records. The 1890 census is irretrievable because it was burnt in a fire in 1921 in the Commerce Department building, where it had been moved to that very day!   The cause of the fire was undetermined, despite thorough investigation.

At first it was reported that only 25 percent had been destroyed and 50 percent was smoke, water and fire damaged, but possibly salvageable.  Later, it was reported that the volumes of census records were not salvageable.  Soon after the fire, salvage attempts were made, but failed. On February 21, 1933 Congress ordered the destruction of the damaged 1890 census papers. The papers were eventually destroyed in 1935.  The only states that still have any partial records remaining are Alabama, District of Columbia, Georgia, Minnesota, New York, New Jersey, South Dakota, North Carolina, Ohio, and Texas, and these are limited to what the states themselves had retained in records.

The 1890 census promised to answer very detailed information on the families of the United States.  Among the information gathered was name, age, sex, relation to head of family, marriage, place of birth, birth place of parents, number of living children, naturalization, profession, school, literacy, chronic disease or disability, and whether or not a person is imprisoned, a convict, a homeless child or a pauper.  The census was also tabulated by machine for the first time.  Despite the fact that it was supposed to be a very accurate system, there were complaints about accuracy and purposeful wrong information being provided, for which there were charges filed against political figures and businessman alike for reporting fraudulent information.

The predicament that the genealogist is today dealing with is a huge road block in determining family relations.  It is very frustrating when a child is born to a family after 1880 and dies before 1900, and there are no existing birth or death records.  However, there are ways around having to use the 1890 census.  As mentioned, there are some remaining intact records, microfilmed and can be viewed at the national and regional archives, and if you are lucky enough to find your family in these areas, you have nothing to worry about with missing information.  The majority of the country is not in the small percentage of the fortunate though.  There is the special enumeration of veterans and widows, city directories, and state census records 1885-1895 (for some states) that can help add to the information missing from research.  Also, most of the larger cities in the nation had newspapers at the time where births and deaths might be recorded, and many of the surrounding smaller towns can be found to have sections of news for in those papers.

For more detailed information concerning the 1890 United States Federal Census, Kellee Blake has written an amazing series outlining what happened called “First in the Path of the Firemen.”

Biblography

“Availability of the 1890 Census,” The United States Census Bureau, (accessed 27 February 2017).

Blake, Kellee.  “First in the Path of the Firemen,” Prologue Magazine, Spring 1996, vol. 28, no. 1.

“Samuel L. Rogers to the Secretary of Congress,” The Washington Herald, 11 January 1921.

“Testimony of John Parsons, Chief Engineer and Electrician, Office of the Solicitor’s Inquiry Concerning the Origin of the Fire in the Department of Commerce Building,” The Washington Herald, 10 January 1921.