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Mennonite Historical Society of Alberta |
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Mennonite Historical Society of Alberta |
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Canada
For information about censuses transcribed or indexed by bodies other than MHSA, see mennonites.ca and select the geography of interest. The MHSA has been involved in some transcription work for both Canada and Russia. Background to Censuses in CanadaCensus records in Canada have been collected by the federal government systematically since 1851, on an every decade basis. After a time, the data grew so valuable, that the decision was to collect it more frequently - on a five-year basis. Originally established by act of Parliament, census records capture information for the federal government in order to implement democractic representation by population. The core part of a census is simply documenting the count of eligible voters by geographic distribution. Over the years, in Canada, the census has moved from a simple tool to one that collects a great deal of information that when summarized, assists in public policy & program planning, distribution of grants, etc. And, when the records become of a certain age, the originals become available to the public as valuable genealogical sources of family connections and life details. The publically-available Canadian census records that are helpful to "Russian" Mennonites were collected in 1881, 1891, 1901, 1906 & 1911. Subsequent records are still closed for privacy reasons. Occasionally, local or specific censuses are also collected, as is the case of the 1880 Village Census of the Mennonite West Reserve published in a book of the same name (available for purchase from the MHSA).
1881The records of the 1881 census have been indexed and are available online at www.familysearch.org. Having found a "hit" in the index, the researcher can go to larger libraries and view the handwritten records on microfilm. Names of households members and their ages for Mennonite communities of southern Manitoba have also been published in a chapter of the Bergthal Gemeinde Buch available for purchase from the MHSA.
1891Some records of the 1891 census have been indexed in discrete projects of many different bodies in Canada. See publications of the Alberta Genealogy Society & the Saskatchewan Genealogy Society. 1901Automated Genealogy and other websites have provided access to indexes to the 1901 Census and encourage such transcriptions. The 1901 Census images are available on microfilm in larger public libraries in Canada and on the National Archives of Canada website. See provincial pages at mennonites.ca for links to indexes/transcriptions done for specific Mennonite communities. See also publications of the Manitoba Genealogy Society (especially Brandon Branch).
© 2003-05 Mennonite Historical Society of Alberta
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