Is it a good idea to add census records to a profile?

+5 votes
284 views
WikiTree profile: Samantha Jamison
in Genealogy Help by David Anthony Taylor G2G6 Mach 1 (16.5k points)
retagged by David Anthony Taylor

2 Answers

+11 votes
I would say that census records add value to a person’s biography. It certainly provides documentation of their life, and may provide information not available elsewhere.

Images are not absolutely essential, if the relevant data is extracted and they are properly cited. The images do add interest, and may be added if you wish.
by George Fulton G2G6 Pilot (626k points)
Great point, thanks.... I'll keep adding them.

David Anthony Taylor

Tracking the given ages of people from census to census can be interesting.  Seeing who gets younger each ten years, or who suddenly "jumps" in age from being younger to nearer their correct age.  Or seeing who was enumerated as several years old in one census, and given an entirely different date of birth on a delayed birth certificate decades later, making them born after that original census.

LOL Melanie Paul you're so on point with that one. Do you also see how many place a person can be born? 1870 - Arkansas, 1880 Texas, 1900 Georgia, 1910 Louisiana. That's why having documentation to support you work is so important.

David Anthony Taylor

Sometimes where a person was born can change around them, when they live and die in the same house in which they were born.

Sometimes those different places of birth can be because someone, sometime, mixed up different people with the same name.

Sometimes it can be because the person giving the information didn't know, so made a "best guess" (maybe it was a neighbour talking to the census taker, or a child).

In the case of immigrants, mostly it's because the geo-political borders had been redrawn several times - as in parts of Europe - so someone born in a German State that was before a unified Germany is suddenly born somewhere they wouldn't recognise.
+12 votes
Yes, by all means.  For many people those are the only records we have.  They aren't always accurate, but if you can follow someone through multiple census records you can build a pretty accurate profile.

There's no need to attach the entire census page to a profile, but you do need to make sure there's a complete citation so others can find it.
by Kathie Forbes G2G6 Pilot (844k points)
I also agree with you, I was told it's better to just add the link and not the data because people would rather just click on the link and see the original document.  

My reply to that is, follow the citation.  I was also told that if you're not a paid member on Ancestry the link will not do you any good. I guess I've been a paid member to long  not to know that. Lol

David Anthony Taylor

It is also helpful to add the household list / table.  Sourcer app does a great job of creating the narrative, inline citation and household table in just a few clicks when a census is found.  There are plenty of options to decide whether to just 'indent' the list or actually put them in a table, etc. 

 Remember, images disappear on Family Search as well as Ancestry to any other site.  More info included in the profiles the better. 

Thanks for the info, Linda!  I've just been copying and pasting the family info and trying to format as best I can.  I prefer to see the info in the profile rather than needing to go to another site to see the info.  If I want to see the image, then I'll go look for it.

David, I prefer to have the info in the profile.  I like to see how a family moved from one area to another and what their profession was.  I find it fascinating.  Even knowing whether a family owned a radio in 1930 is interesting to me.

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