![\"census-taker-comes\"](\"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/census-taker-comes.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nIt is June 3, 1860.<\/p>\n
Anna Gufferman, who is twelve years old, sees a stranger approaching\u00a0her small home. He looks reasonably dressed and does not appear to be\u00a0carrying a weapon. Illinois is not as wild a place as Nebraska where\u00a0her cousins live, but mother has warned her that one can never be too\u00a0careful. She shoos her five younger siblings in the house as the man\u00a0approaches.<\/p>\n
He approaches the front yard and calls out for the man or the woman\u00a0of the house and says he is here to ask questions for something\u00a0called the “census.” Anna is wary of calling for her parents if there\u00a0is no need. When Father and the boys are in the field, he does not\u00a0like to be disturbed, not even if Grandfather comes. Mother is down\u00a0at the creek by herself, having left Anna with the children. The\u00a0weekly washing is one of the few times Mother does not have several\u00a0small children underfoot, and Anna is hesitant to bother her if it is\u00a0not absolutely necessary. Anna decides this “census” does not require\u00a0her to disturb her parents. She tells the census taker that she is\u00a0very familiar with the family and the goings on in the household.\u00a0After all, she is twelve years old and responsible for several
\nyounger siblings.<\/p>\n
The census taker asks Anna several questions, which she frankly\u00a0thinks are none of his business. He tells her that the government\u00a0needs to know this information and that it is important it be\u00a0accurate. Anna does the best she can to answer his questions. He\u00a0starts by asking her the names of her parents and her siblings.<\/p>\n
“It is a good thing my parents are not here,” Anna thinks to herself.\u00a0While her English is rudimentary, it is considerably better than the\u00a0handful of words her parents have managed to learn. Determined to\u00a0impress the census man with her knowledge of English, she indicates\u00a0that her parents are not Hinrich and Anneke Gufferman, but that they\u00a0are rather Henry and Ann. Her other siblings all have names more\u00a0German sounding than Anna’s. She decides to provide the census taker\u00a0\u00a0with English versions of their names, just as she did with those of\u00a0her parents.<\/p>\n
Anna is not quite certain how old her parents and her siblings are,\u00a0but the man seems to insist on knowing their age precisely. Their\u00a0christening names and dates of birth would be in the family bible,\u00a0but Mother would fly into an absolute rage if Anna got the bible\u00a0herself and began leafing through it. Deciding it was not worth the\u00a0risk of her mother catching her in the act, Anna guesses as to the\u00a0age of her parents. Despite her uncertainty, she speaks clearly and\u00a0distinctly to convince the census man that she knows the ages\u00a0precisely. He seems pleased to get the information.<\/p>\n
He then asks where her parents were born. Anna knows they were born\u00a0in Germany and were married there. Those questions are easy. The\u00a0census man then asks where she and her siblings were born. These\u00a0questions are not so easy. She cannot remember which of her older\u00a0brothers were born in Germany and which ones were born in Illinois.\u00a0She remembers that her parents lived for a while in Ohio before\u00a0coming to Illinois. And frankly, she is getting tired of all the\u00a0questions. Consequently she tells the census taker that her two older\u00a0brothers were born in Germany, the next was born in Ohio and that all\u00a0the remaining children were born in Illinois.<\/p>\n
Anna decides to give hurried answers to the rest of the census man’s\u00a0questions. He has taken time away from her chores and Mother will not\u00a0be happy if the morning tasks are not done when she returns.\u00a0Occasionally impatient with Anna’s delayed answers, the census man\u00a0seems pleased when Anna begins answering the questions more quickly.\u00a0Eager to please and knowing she should return to her chores, Anna\u00a0speedily answers the remaining questions, paying little concern to\u00a0the accuracy of her answers.<\/p>\n
It is June 25, 1880.<\/p>\n
The census taker arrives at the home of Hinrich and Anneke Gufferman.It is a different place than his fellow enumerator encountered in\u00a01860. Hinrich and Anneke have two children at home, the youngest son\u00a0who helps his father farm and a daughter who works as a hired girl\u00a0for a Swedish couple up the road. There is still plenty of work for\u00a0Anneke to perform around the house, but no longer meeting the needs\u00a0of twelve children makes her life less harried than it was before.<\/p>\n
Anneke invites the census taker into her kitchen and after he\u00a0indicates some of the information he needs, she goes and gets the\u00a0family bible, which contains the names and dates of birth for her\u00a0husband and her children. She opens the bible to the appropriate page\u00a0and tells the census taker there is the information. The entries are\u00a0written in Hinrich’s bold, clean script and the census taker only has\u00a0difficulty in reading the name of the youngest daughter Trientje,\u00a0which he copies down as Fruita. Otherwise the odd-sounding names are\u00a0easy to read and the census taker simply copies them into his record.<\/p>\n
There are additional questions and Anneke provides the answers as\u00a0best she can. In Germany, her husband was a day laborer and had moved\u00a0several times looking for work. When asked where her husband’s\u00a0parents were born she is not certain; Hinrich’s mother died when he\u00a0was a baby and the father had died shortly after their marriage.\u00a0Anneke told him the parents were born in Germany. Anneke was not
\ncertain of her father’s place of birth, either. He had died before\u00a0her birth and had been a soldier. Anneke had been named for her\u00a0father’s mother, with a first name that was unusual for the area of\u00a0Germany where she was from. Thinking her father was Dutch, she told\u00a0the census taker that her father was born in Holland. But she was not\u00a0really certain.<\/p>\n
It is June 16, 1900.<\/p>\n
The census taker comes to the door of Hinrich Gufferman. It has been\u00a0a month since his beloved Anneke has died. Hinrich does not know the\u00a0census taker. He swears at him in German in a booming voice and the\u00a0enumerator senses that he will get no answers. Gufferman’s son Johann\u00a0lives a few miles up the road, fortunately in the same township. The\u00a0son had told the census taker that Hinrich was taking the death very\u00a0badly and was only speaking to a few family members. Johann told the\u00a0census taker to come back if information was needed on the father. It\u00a0looked like the enumerator would have to take Johann up on his offer.<\/p>\n
Ever wondered why some census entries look like creative accounting?\u00a0Have you ever thought about what actually transpired when the census\u00a0taker arrived at your ancestor’s home?<\/p>\n
(c) 2014 Michael John Neill–this article originally appeared in the Ancestry Daily News <\/i>and is used by the author on his blog with permission. Any other reproduction or publication is not permitted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
THE CENSUS TAKER COMETH,” by Michael John Neill (c) 2014 Michael John Neill–this article originally appeared in the\u00a0Ancestry Daily News\u00a0and is used by the author on his blog with permission. It is June 3, 1860. Anna Gufferman, who is twelve years old, sees a stranger approaching\u00a0her small home. He looks reasonably dressed and does not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[176,55],"class_list":["post-1789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-census","tag-methodology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1789\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rootdig.genealogytipoftheday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}