Now that federal census images are available online from multiple providers, it's always a good idea to search each of them for your missing ancestors.
Some of the reasons why this is a good idea:
• Indexers may interpret handwritten names differently, leading to elusive family members
• Image quality may improve from another provider
• Some years of the decennial census may be completely indexed at one provider and not at another
Give the census from an alternative source like FamilySearch a try – you may be pleasantly surprised.
Excellent tip! There are a few in my tree that have continually eluded me for certain years. I know they are SOMEWHERE because they show up in a later census. I almost always used Ancestry so I'll give the others a try and see what happens! Thanks!
ReplyDeleteThis is definitely a good tip. I have found several ancestors I couldn't find previously while searching the familysearch.org census records. Their transcription differences from Ancestry were just enough for a wild card search to find my ancestors.
ReplyDeleteThis is so true! Also, sometimes I can find an ancestor at FamilySearch but there's no image. I go to HeritageQuest with the known information and can usually see and copy the image. I have experience with every one of your suggestions. Thanks for sharing the tip for those who don't know and for reminding those of us who do.
ReplyDelete