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Volunteers Review Millions of Names from 1950 Census

The FamilySearch website has a map that shows the progress of the three review tasks for creating the 1950 U.S. census digital index. This is the progress as of May 23, 2022. Screenshot from FamilySearch.org, courtesy of Church News© Copyright 2022 Deseret News Publishing Company

 
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By Christine Rappleye, Church News
 

More than half of the 151 million names in the 1950 U.S. census have been reviewed with help from more than 115,000 volunteers, according to an email sent to FamilySearch patrons. 

Nevada was recently added as one of seven states where records are available for searching on FamilySearch.org and Ancestry.com, according to a FamilySearch email from May 13. The other states are Delaware, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming. 

FamilySearch and Ancestry have partnered to create a searchable index for the 1950 census. The images were released on April 1, 2022, by the National Archives, after the required 72-year wait. Ancestry workers have been using the company’s proprietary artificial intelligence handwriting-recognition technology to scan the census forms. 

The images then go to FamilySearch for volunteers, who are assigned three review tasks. The first two steps involve reviewing the names and then the header information in the Get Involved app to verify information that can improve the index.

A third step is to review families, group them by household and review the details for each person as all of the fields in the census are being indexed. This is completed through the Get Involved web experience, according to information from FamilySearch. 

FamilySearch has a map of the progress for each state on its website. 

As of Monday, May 23, Utah and Nevada were listed at 100% completed, with all three review tasks completed.

As of May 27, Idaho was listed at 97% complete, Arizona was listed at 76%.

FamilySearch and Ancestry are partnering to digitize the 1950 U.S. Census. Photo courtesy of FamilySearch.org.© 2022 by Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved.

States that are between 60% and 74% completed include Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Maine, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming state. 

Review for names and records for more than a dozen other states — California, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa, Arkansas, Louisiana, Indiana, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Vermont and Rhode Island — is between 25% and 50% completed. 

See www.familysearch.org/getinvolved/1950 for updates on the 1950 U.S. census and how to help, including what projects are getting close to being finished. 

Copyright 2022 Deseret News Publishing Company.

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