Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-04-19
A CARD FOR A LIFE.
Sixty-Five Million Pasteboards
Tell The Tale of Uncle
Sans People.
PROGRESS OF THE CENSUS,
Reports Promised by Commissioner
Porter by Next Fall,
ELECTRICAL COUNTING MACHINES.
Chamber Of Woe Where Nine Million Mort
cages Are Recorded.
PROGRESS OF THE CENSUS.
ELECTRICAL COUNTING MACHINES.
Chamber Of Woe Where Nine Million Mort
cages Are Recorded.
WOMEN MORE EFFICIENT THAN MEN

the new census goes rapidly on and to-day
$500 heads are buzzing with fgnres and
1000 hands are working away on the re.
ports that have come in by the millions
from every nook and corner of the United
States 1t is impossible to conceive the
immensitv of this stock-taking The
counting of the people themselves was q
gigantic task but it was completed months
ago, and we now know that we have Just
about 65,0O0,000 of souls in the United
States. Each one OF these people, however,
has history, and the story of every one has
been written down on a page of long FOOLS
cap paper and has been sent here to WASH
ington. There are 65, 900 900 Of these pages,
and one of the census officers tells me that
ii these were made of the thinnest of writing
paper and laid fat one on top Of the other,
they would make a pile of sheets higher
than the Washington Monument and go
heavy that it would take several camel
back engines to carry them. The counting
Of the people from these slips was done
within a few weeks and the count
Was Registered by Electricity.
Commissioner of the Census Porter tells me
his machinery is such that he could count the
whole world in three months, and this count
Ing is going On here in a way that has been
done in no census heretofore. The Austrian
Government has just written asking about
1t, and the Germans, English and French
are looking on with wonder at our electrical
census taking. With these machines Mr..
Porter's clerks counted 1900, 600 people
day, and he had for 4 time relays of clerks
so that the work went on day and night, and
the result is that this census is being taken
quicker than any census of history.
The tenth census, that of 1880, published
nothing to speak of until 1885, and its COM
pendium was not out until that date. Mr..
Porter tells me that he will have the COM
pendium of this census published and in
the hands of the people before the next Con-
gress meets, and this compendium will con-
sst Of two large volumes about the size of
"Blackstone's Commentaries, and it will
contain the complete summary of all the in
formation gathered during the present CEN
sus. The work Of the census will altogether
comprise IL large volumes each the size of
the average law book.
Counting Done by Electricity.
The greatest part of this work is done by
electricity. These millions of schedules are
handed over to Hundreds of clerks, and they
by system of numbers strike KEYS in a sort
Of q cribbage board machine, which punches
holes In little cards in such places as tell
exactly what the schedules record. The
cards are twice as long as postal card and
OF the same width. By looking at them the
clerks can tell whether the man was a
Soldier, pauper or an idiot, whether he was
o criminal or preacher, or whether the card
represents the record Of a woman or a child
OF months old. 1t will tell whether the
woman is married, single, widow or divorced,
and each Of these records is made by the
touching of button instead of by writing
out the full name.
1t is a shorthand run by a typewritipg
machine, aud it is so rapid that one woman
put down the histories OF 30, 900 people in
one day upon $4,000 of these cards. These
cards are of uniform size. Each man,
woman and child of the United States will
have one of them here. They will be
properly stored away and indeIed, and
hundred years from now your children's
find out all about you, TO rake up the record of
your diseases and to know whether you were
married, divorced, in debt, insane, and the
Lord knows what else.
Very Near Approach to Intelligence
After these holes are punched on the card
II is taken 10 another typewriting machine
run by electricity before which another
bright-eyed mble-fngered girl sits, and
she, by putting the card under a metal plate
and showing a punch, records on dial just
what there is on the card. At this same
time little box opens automatically tor
the cards that are like one another, and in
this way the generalization is done. 1t is
done in such a manner that it cannot make
mistakes and with the least possible amount
OF brain work on the part of the operator.
It is the nearest approach of material sub
stance being made to do the work of an in
telligent being have ever seen, and it is es-
timated that it will save the Government
hundreds Of thousands of dollars.
Each of these machines is run by electric
ity. They look like little cabinet organs,
and, as the keys are struck, bells ring on
each OF the machines and the whole room
jingles as though an hundred silvery sleigh
bells we're being shaken at the same time
They were invented by young man named
Hollerith, who was connected with the last
census, aud who gets 50 day for each ma
ch inc. l understand that the Austrian
Government intends TO introduce them into
Its census taking, and the process will prob
ably be adopted everywhere.
Commissioner Porter's Big Cannery.
visited the diffetent buildings of the Cen
sus with Mr.. Porter, tine Commissioner. He
is a dark-iaced, bright-eyed, lack-haired,
well-dressed young man of about 81, who
has Tor the past is years been delving in
facts and figures and making money out OF
the diggings. AT 18 he went on the Chicago
Inter Ocean, and a few years later travelled |
all over the West getting up information for |
that paper about the Western States. The |
Inter Ocean paid him well for this and he |
sold the letters in book form after it was |
over to publisher for a Thousand dollars. |
He was connected with the last census, with |
the tariff commission and his whole life has |
been one of facts and figures.
As we WeEt from building 10 building |
located at wide distances apart over the |
CITY, l referred to the immense amount |
which the United States was paving in rent /
and asked him what his rents amounted to,
He replied that the Census paid $40, 600 a
year and that the Government could make a
big interest By constructing its own build
ing. The building in which the Census
clerks DO their CHIEF work is a narrow, tall
cheap affair constructed for fats and another
building, McDowells mill, near the Capi-
soI.
Cans Filled With Record Cards
This building is more like a cannery or a
factory than a Government warehouse.
Q pom entering it L found its walls unplas-
tered and great rows Of TIN cans packed in
piles one on top of the other So that a hall as
big as the average Town Council room was
illed with them. Each of these cans was 20