Historical treasure trove

In 1950, a 15-year-old Elvis Presley lived on Winchester Avenue in Memphis with his mom Gladys, dad Vernon and grandmother Minnie.

Interestingly, Presley was spelled "Pressley" in the 1950 census.

"There's always mistakes with the spelling of names," longtime, local genealogist Kim Morgan said. "I know these enumerators were trained on this particular census. The government really wanted accuracy."

In Dyess, Ark., an 18-year-old J.R. Cash lived with his parents Ray and Carrie and siblings Tommy and Joanne, recorded as "Tom" and "Joan" in the census. Young J.R. would go on to change his name to Johnny and become the Man in Black.

Marilyn Monroe lived in Beverly Hills Township in L.A. She was 21 and, according to the 1950 census, only worked her actress job for eight hours the previous week.

After 72 years, the 1950 census was finally released by the National Archives and Records Administration on April 1, providing a treasure trove of information for researchers and genealogists searching for clues in America's history.

Morgan said she dug into the 1950 census the second it was released.

"Every person that has any interest in genealogy, beginning or advanced, as soon as it hits the National Archives we’re in it right away," she said. "That is one the most important singular tools we have. It's one of the easiest tools."

What's known as the "72-Year Rule" prevents the U.S. Census Bureau from releasing personally identifiable information before that span of time has passed.

After 72 years, the records are released to the public. In accordance with the 72-Year Rule, the National Archives released the 1930 records in April 2002 and the 1940 records were released April 2, 2012.

The 1950 census was the first time Americans abroad were counted, including members of the armed forces and crews working out at sea.

Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero welcomed the release of the census in a celebration video recorded in the National Archives building in Washington, D.C. He said the National Archives had spent a decade preparing for the release of the 1950 Census, scanning original microfilm it received from the Census Bureau.

"Even with a pandemic, staff continued to make progress indexing the 1950 Census records, thanks to their skillful use of today's digital technologies," he said.

The 1950 census contains nearly 7 million records, more than double the 3.8 million records of the 1940 census.

Although the National Archives has released census information for decades, this is the first time it is simultaneously providing a first, rough draft of the name index. An artificial intelligence-enhanced optical character recognition (OCR) tool was used to provide the draft. This tool was used with a transcription feature the National Archives is encouraging people to use.

"This is an opportunity for you to help us refine enhance OCR-created names and make the population schedules more accessible for everyone," Ferriero said.

He said this is the first census in which he is recorded and he is looking forward to finding his family records in Beverly, Mass.

"The census is full of family stories, and we know you are eager to look for yours," he said.

Morgan said anytime something as important as a census comes out, "it's gold."

"It solves family mysteries, you can track how your family moves from place to place, it can lead to answers about adoption, you get a ton of rich details about professions, who was living in the household," she said. "It solves some questions and mysteries. You can find people who were missing in the family and you can connect with cousins.

"It never, ever gets old," Morgan said. "That census record brings it all back to life again."