How to Locate People in the 1940 U.S. Census

By Kimberly Powell, About.com Guide

Once you have an address where your individual or family was likely living in 1940, the next step is to determine the Enumeration District (ED) in which that address was located. A number of tools are available online to help make that easier, but the best place to start is a regular map, such as Google Maps, which you can use to identify the location of the address, including nearby streets.

Next, use the address and cross streets from the map to determine the correct 1940 Census Enumeration District. The National Archives has 1940 census Enumeration District maps and descriptions available online through their free Online Public Access tool. To make this process even easier, try the 1940 Census ED One-Step tools developed by Stephen P. Morse, PhD and Joel D. Weintraub, PhD. Just enter the state, county, city (when applicable), and address, and the database will, in most cases, identify the correct ED. If the best information you have is an ED from the 1930 census, then they have a tool to help you convert that to a 1940 census ED as well. Learn more about how to use these tools in the step-by-step examples below.

With your Enumeration District identified, you can now navigate directly to that ED in the 1940 census images online, leaving you with only about 30-32 double-sided census pages to browse (about 60 digital images) for your name(s) of interest.

See it in Practice:
Locating Big City Residents in the 1940 Census - Babe Ruth
Locating Small Town Residents in the 1940 Census - Albert Einstein
Locating Individuals by their 1930 Census Location - Laura Ingalls & Almanzo Wilder

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• How to Locate People in the 1940 U.S. Census
• How to Navigate to an Address in the 1940 Census Images
• Babe Ruth in the 1940 Census
• Albert Einstein in the 1940 Census
• Almanzo & Laura Ingalls Wilder in the 1940 U.S. Census

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