Census History and Map

The "Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920" by William Thorndale and William Dollarhide, copyrighted 1987, and published by Genealogical Publishing - contains valuable maps of each State/Territory, with county lines, at the time of each census.

Importantly, it also gives a full explanation of the history and "completeness", and "HOW" so many errors are found in various censuses.

With a bibliography of 43 different sources, and about 20 pages of that history and background provided, this source is invaluable to any serious family history researcher.

In short, it's interesting to note, i.e.: that in 1850 (and some other years) the law required THREE copies of the census - one to the county courthouse, one to the Secretary of State of the state or territory, and one to the Secretary of the Interior (no census bureau then.) Conducted by the U.S. Marshals and their appointed assistants, and the "copying" was then their responsibility.   General practice was to send the "prettier" COPIES to the State and Feds, and retain the original pages at the county courthouse!!!!!

Make sense now how many of the discrepancies occured, as hand-transcribed COPIES often became the images we find on-line today.??

The specific instructions for each census year are given.

I have a copy of this resource, and happy to answer specific questions...     Art