Monday, July 16, 2012

1940 U.S. Census Index Comparisons - Post 2: Carringer in California

I proposed a methodology for evaluating the accuracy and completeness of the 1940 United States Census indexes on Ancestry.com and FamilySearch.org in 1940 U.S. Census Index Comparisons - Post 1: Methodology.

My first attempt at doing this comparison was to compare the Carringer surname (exact spelling) in California.  

Using my methodology described, I created Table 1 with all of the names found doing a search on Ancestry.com (only part of it displayed below):



When the person listed in the Ancestry matches does not appear in the FamilySearch.org index, I put an "X" in column 5 and left column 6 blank so that I could easily see who was missing in the FamilySearch matches.  

There were 28 matches for "Carringer" surname in California on Ancestry.com, and 20 matches on FamilySearch.  All 20 matches on FamilySearch had an entry on Ancestry.  Of the 20 similar entries on both lists, there were two differences in the name, date or birthplace index entries.   These were:

*  Ancestry #5 (FS #16): "Mrs. Nora" on A, vs. "Nora" on FS
* Ancestry#13 (FS 7):  "Abbie Della" born 1812 on A, born 1862 on FS (FS is right in this case)

Ancestry had 8 more entries on the match list for "Carringer" in California.  These 8 names are in three families in the census. We'll look at these one at a time:


*  Edward J. Carringer, born 1902 in IL (California ED 38-46, Page 88B):




Ancestry.com indexed the entry as "Edward J. Carringer."  FamilySearch indexed it as "Edward J. Carrigan."  I think that I would have indexed it as Carrigan.  Best indexer:  FamilySearch.

*  The Virgil Carringer family (Virgil, Evelyn, Marie) (California ED 60-1038, Page 4B):



Ancestry.com indexed this surname entry as "Carringer."  FamilySearch indexed it as "Larrings." I would have indexed it as "Carringer" based on similar capital C entries on the census page. Best indexer:  Ancestry (3 entries)

*  The Mary Carringer family (MAry, Gladys, Ruth, June) (California ED 60-1038, Page 10A):




Ancestry.com indexed this surname entry as "Carringer."  FamilySearch indexed it as "Garringer." I would have indexed it as "Carringer" based on similar capital C entries on the census page. Best indexer:  Ancestry (4 entries).

Here is my Table 2 with the families with different index entries:



The families with matches on Ancestry, but not on FamilySearch, are listed as A-1, A-2, A-3, etc.  If there had been matches in FamilySearch that were not listed on Ancestry, I would have termed the families as F-1, F-2, F-3, etc.  

I hope to do one of these posts every day for the next week or so.  I'm using surnames of interest to me. The results may vary from surname to surname, or from state to state.

To date, my score is Ancestry 7, FamilySearch 1.

If readers want an MSWord document with blank table fields, please email me at rjseaver@cox.net or create your own based on my examples above.  I can get 30 lines on Table 1 on a portrait page. I've found it easiest to type right into the Table rather than writing the data down in longhand.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2012/07/1940-us-census-index-comparisons-post-2.html

Copyright (c) 2012), Randall J. Seaver

1 comment:

theKiwi said...

Considering the ditto marks on 2 of those entries, you might also consider that the score is 2-1, not 7-1 - after all FamilySearch Indexing was only wrong twice :-)