History

Data@Museums

Basque Museum & Cultural Center

The Basque Museum & Cultural Center's exhibit, "Ostatuak—A Basque Sense of Home" used census
records to identify previously unknown Basque-owned boarding houses in the United States

Photo courtesy of the Basque Museum & Cultural Center.

In the summer of 2015, the Basque Museum & Cultural Center in Boise, ID, opened an exhibit titled, "Ostatuak—A Basque Sense of Home," featuring the history of Basque boarding houses in the United States. To prepare the exhibit, volunteers and staff studied the 1900 to 1940 census records from Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Washington looking for Basque names and responses to the "Country of Birth" inquiry. From these data, the museum compiled lists of Basques who were "hotel proprietors" or had "boarders" listed as living at the same address. Their research identified many previously unknown boarding houses.

Although the museum completed research for the exhibit, staff continue to use census records to find new ways to tell the history of Basque communities in the United States.

To learn more about the Basque population and the exhibit "Ostatuak—A Basque Sense of Home," visit the Basque Museum & Cultural Center. .