History

Artifacts

1890 Enumerators' Postcard

As part of their official supplies for the 1890 Census, enumerators received two daily report postcards for each working day—one addressed to their district supervisor and the other to the Superintendent of Census in Washington, DC.

Because enumerator pay was tied to the number of people, farms, and manufacturing establishments counted (rates ranging from $.02–.20 per person or business), it was crucial to keep an accurate record of enumerators' activities using postcards like the one shown below for Spurgeon, IN—a town approximately 120 miles southwest of the center of the United States population in 1890.

Few of the census records represented by these postcards remain for research as a result of a January 1921 fire in the basement of the U.S. Department of Commerce Building. For more information about the availability of surviving 1890 Census records, visit "Availability of 1890 Census."

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Front of an 1890 Census postcard used by an enumerator to record his daily activities in Spurgeon, IN.

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Back of an 1890 Census postcard used by an enumerator to record his daily activities in Spurgeon, IN.

Learn more about interesting census-related artifacts on the Census Bureau's social media pages using the tag #ArtifactFriday. For previous #ArtifactFriday posts, visit the History Web site's Artifacts pages.