1950 Census Returns for Families in Texas

I had not yet had time to search at the National Archives 1950 census website for my ancestors and decided to locate the families who lived in Erath County, Texas. When I heard that Ancestry had completed their indexing project, similar to NARA’s, using optical character recognition of the handwriting, I decided to make a comparison.

I searched first for my grandmother's father, George W. Lancaster, in Stephenville, Erath County, Texas at Ancestry. The first entry came right up with the correct spelling and correct wife, Lela A.[1]

Searching at the NARA 1950 census website, the first return was also George Lancaster with the next person being Lela a.[2]

Stephenville, Erath Co, Texas; 888 W. McNeill

Next, I searched for my grandmother's father-in-law, Thomas N. Johnston, first at Ancestry and he came right up at the first entry.[3] At the NARA site, he came up as the second entry. The handwriting on these sheets is very legible, so that is likely a reason the OCR worked so well.

Stephenville, Erath Co, Texas; 1003 W. Green

Lastly, for the Texas families, I searched for I. F. Bay and his wife, Mildred, who is a daughter of Thomas N. Johnston and my grandmother's sister-in-law. The first entry back on the Ancestry search brought me Issac F. Bay and wife Mildred, even though I did not include his full first name.[4] The NARA site returned his entry as the first one, too. My mother's two cousins were listed, too.

McAllen, Hidalgo Co, Texas; 700 E. Kendallwood St

I can conclude with these three samples, that the OCR reading of the handwriting for the three households in Texas has worked out very well. It is likely due to the fact the handwriting of the particular enumerators is very legible.


[1] 1950 U.S. census, Erath County, Texas, Stephenville, ED 72-2, sheet 21, lines 24-25, George W. Lancaster household, image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/62308/); NARA T628, roll 3983.

[2] 1950 U.S. census, Erath County, Texas, Stephenville, ED 72-2, sheet 21, lines 24-25, George W. Lancaster household, image, 1950 Census (https://1950census.archives.gov/search/); NARA T628, roll 3983.

[3] 1950 U.S. census, Erath County, Texas, Stephenville, ED 72-4, sheet 6, lines 3-4, Thomas N. Johnston household, image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/62308/); NARA T628, roll 3983.

[4] 1950 U.S. census, Hidalgo County, Texas, McAllen, ED 108-27, sheet 9, lines 1-4, Issac F. Bay household, image, image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/62308/); NARA T628, roll 3325.


Copyright © 2022 by Lisa S. Gorrell, Mam-ma's Southern Family, All rights reserved.

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