NARA released the 1950 population census schedules for researcher use on April 1, 2022, at https://1950census.archives.gov. This is the 59th in a series of blog posts on the 1950 census. This post was last updated January 13, 2023.
Image Quality
The National Archives received the 1950 Census on microfilm from the Bureau of the Census. This microfilm contains:
- Duplicate images
- Pages that are crumpled or folded
- Images that appear cut off (usually Portfolio Control Labels)
- Images that are overexposed (too light) or underexposed (too dark)
The National Archives scanned the microfilm to provide images for the Official 1950 Census website (https://1950census.archives.gov/). The Census Bureau destroyed the original paper census records in 1961-1963, so original pages that were crumpled or folded cannot be recovered. However, the camera operators often refilmed (filmed twice) pages they thought had image quality problems, so you may find a second copy of the same page that is slightly less crumpled or not folded.
Missing Pages
A few pages were not microfilmed in 1952 due to camera operator error and are therefore missing. The following is a list of known missing pages. We will add missing pages to this list as we become aware of them.
- California: Mendocino: ED 23-11: Sheet 13
- Florida: Polk: ED 53-59B: Sheet 7
- Indiana: Howard: ED 34-7: Sheet 71
- Massachusetts: Middlesex County: Waltham City: ED 9-570: Sheet 10
- New York: Kings County: ED 24-3483: Sheet 4
- North Dakota: McLean: ED 28-62B: Sheet 49
- Ohio: Cuyahoga County: Lakewood City: ED 97-61: Sheets 7 and 12
- Washington: Thurston County: ED 34-36: Sheet 4