The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-04-19
The new CENSUS
How POrter's Electrical Machines
are Being Worked.
HE SAYS THE WEST is ALL RIGHT
A Look at the Census Cannery, and Something
About the Din of Its Card
Stampers.

WASHINGTON, April 16, 1S91.-[Special
correspondence Of THE HERALD. - The
work of the new census goes rapidly on and
TODAY thirty-five hundred heads are buzz
zing with figures and seven thousand hands
are working away here in Washington on
the reports that have come in by the mil
lions from every nook and corner OF the
United States. 1t has cost millions Of dol
lars to get these reports, and about fifty
thousand different men have been at work
during the past year in getting them to-
gether. They cover all our territory from
Alaska to Florida and they deal with the
Den and women Of day in every quarter
of'this whole country. They tell just what
kind of people they are. give reports of all
their ailments and all their good points, tell
all about their property and in short de-
scribe everything with which they are con-
nected. These reports contain full partic-
ulars of the individual and corporate wealth
of the country. They tell what our manu-
facturers and farmers are doing and they
are IN fact the records Of Uncle SANS great
account of stock which he takes every ten
men and children together with his farm
animals and puts down on paper just what
everything connected with them is worth.
UNCLE SANS sToCK-TAKING.
1t is impossible to conceive the immensely
of this stock taking. The counting of the
people themselves was gigantic task but
it was completed months ago and we now
know that we have just about sixty-tive
million souls in the United States. Each
one of these people, however, has history
and the story of everyone has been written
down on page of long foolscap paper and
has been sent here to Washington. There
are sixty-fve million of these pages and
one of the census officers tells me that If
these were made of the thinnest of writing
paper and laid fiat one on top Of the other,
they would make a pile of sheets higher
than the Washington monument, and so
heavy that 1t would take several camel
back engines to carry them. The counting
of the people from these slips was done
within few weeks ard the count was reg
istered 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 counting is going
on here in a way that has been done in NO
census heretofore. The Australian govern
the German, English and French are look
ing on with wonder at our electrical census
taking. With these machines, MIR. POr-
ter's clerks counted four million people g
day and he mad for a 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
pendulum was not out until that date. Mr.
Porter tells me that he will have the com
pendulum of this census published ana ii
the hands Of the people before the mex
Congress meets, and this compendium vii
consist of two large volumes about the size
of Blackstone's Commentaries and it vii
contain the complete summary of all the in
formation gathered during the present cen
sus. The work of the census will alto
gether comprise eleven large volumes eact
the size of the average law book and these
will give the figures and congratulations II
regard TO everything in the United States
COUNTING BY ELECTRICITY.
The greatest part of this work is done b.
electricity. These millions of schedule
are handed over to hundreds of clerks an
they by a system of numbers strike keys il
q sort of a cribbage board machine whic
punches holes in little cards in such place
as tell exactly what the schedules record
The cards are twice as long as postal car
and Of the same width. BY looking at them
the clerks can tell whether the man was
soldier, pauper or an idiot, whether b
was a criminal or preacher, or whethe
the card represents the record of woman
or q child of two months old. 1t will te
whether the woman is married, single
widow or divorced, and each Of these rec
ords is made by the touching of butte
instead of by writing out the full name.
sls,,,A %fr
machine, and it is so rapid that one woma
put down the histories of fifty thousan
people in one day upon fifty thousand c
these cards. These cards are of uniforI
size. Each man, woman and child Of tn
United States will have one Of them here
They will be probably stored away and In
dexed and hundred years from now you
ohildren's children will be able to com
here and to find out all about you, to rak
up the record Of your diseases and to knol
whether you were married, divorced,
debt, insane and the Lord knows what elss
After these holes are punched on the caro-
it is taken to another type-writing machir
run by electricity before which anothe
bright-eyed, nimble fingered girl sits an
she, by putting the card under meta
plate and showing punch, records on a dii
Just what there is on the card. At thi
same time, a little box opens automaticall
for the cards that are like one another an
in this way the generalization is done.
is done in such manner that it cannt
make mistakes and with the least poSsib
exercise of brain work on the part of tn
operator. 1t is the nearest approach
material substance being made to do Il
work of an intelligent being 1 have eve
seen, and it is estimated that it will sa,
the government hundreds of thousands
dollars. Each of these machines is run
electricity. They look like little cabin
organs and as the keys are struck, bel
ring on each of the machines and the who
room jingles as though an hundred silver
sleigh bells were being shaken at the san
time. They were invented by a young ms
named Hollerith who was connected Wi
the last census and gets three dollars ds
for the Use Of each machine. / understaI
that the Austrian government intends
introduce them into its census taking, al
the process will probably be adopted ever
where.
COMMISSIONER PoRTER's cANNERY.
visited the different buildings of 4
census with MIR. Porter, the commissions
He is a dsrk-faced, bright-eyed, blac
haired, well dressed young man of abol
thirty seven, who has for the past eighte,
years been delving in facts and figures al
making money out OF the digging.
eighteen he went on the Chicago Inter Oced
and few years later Travelled all over t
west getting up information for that pap
about the western states. The Inter-Ocet
paid him well for this and he sold the Il
tiers in book form after it was over to
publisher for $1,000 He was connect
with the last census, with the tariff col
mission and his whole life has been one
facts and figures. As we went from bull
ing to building located at wide distanc
apart over the city, I referred to the il
mense amount which the United Stat
was paying il rent, and asked him VIII
his rents amounted to. He replied that t
census paid $4,000 a year and that the 90
ernment could make big interest by &C