Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1919-02-22
CENSUS JOB IS
SOON TO START
Government Laying Basis for One
Of It's Greater Peace Time Tasks
Take Q. s. Inventory.

Washington.-With hostiIities at
an end, the government is now lay
ing the basis for one Of the greater
OF its peace time tasks-the decen-
NAL inventory Of tho United States,
its people, lands, industry. and
livestock that Is called the census.
Secretary of Commerce Redfield
the other day signed the order that
transferred one of the largest of the
temporary war buildings put up in
Washington, that formerly housing
the army's department of aero
nautfcs, to Director of the Census
Rogers ana his staff.
Actually. the government began
the job some months ago, assemb-
ling its plans and forces. BY law,
the beginning OF the census period
Of 1920 is July 1, 1919, though it
will not be until a year from April
that the enumerators will be set at
work. It is then that every indi-
vidual in America, or some one act
ing for the individual, will be asked
the series of questions that must be
answered
in the 1920 census, according to the
present design of Director Rogers
dummy cards, which now are being
given the exhaustive study OF sta
tisticians. The more complex ques
tion1aires that go in industrial es-
adjustments, schools, farms and
every other permanent institution
Of the country are likewise in the
development stage, undergoing crit
ical examination in the light of *
perience the government has gained
in conducting IL inventories of the
kind.
Chiefly the bureau is engaged in
preparing for the classification and
tabulation of the vast quantity Of
material which will be assembled.
The 1920 census tabulation will be
for the first time almost completely
a machine operation, conducted by
means of devices useful only to the
census bureau Of the United States
which have been invented and are
NOW being built by men in its EN-
plOy. Electric machines will first
transfer the written information
coming in on the enumerators'
sheets to cards, not by writing, but
by punching holes at proper points.
Then the punched cards will be
handed in their millions to another
battery of machines, the tabulators,
an amazing product of human in
genuity E NJ BOiteaux, who de-
visad them, has been with the cen
sus for IS years, and is now super
intending the construction of %
Il, -f I'll,
he will direct.
These tabulators, working with
smooth and silent perfection, take
in 400 cards a minute, count them,
reject all that are imperfect or i'm
properly punched in any fashion,
and take off the totals of punch
marks. assembling the final result
in printed figures on handy sheets.
One of them the other day in eight
hours handled 10000 cards, COM
piling information that would rep
resent the population statistics of a
very stable American city. Their
experimental use was commenced
after the 1910 census, but Mr.. Boi-
teaux has since devoted most of his
time to their Improvement, and to
the extension of their abilities.
The machines resemble in out
ward aspect a piece of office fur
piture. Cards go into a metallic
magazine at their top, travel few
inches on metal guides, come out
neatly stacked with the mistakes of
the punching machines-which
have merely human operators
pointed out. The printed records
of the IS or 90 totals that the punch
marks indicate come out from an
other slot. and the instrument
stands ready to repeat
With these machines. there is
practical assurance that the publ
cations of the census. usually COM
ing out a long time after the enum-
Grafton, may be more quickly at
hand to guide the estimates of gov
ernmental and Industrial leaders.
and generally guide and demon
strate the progress of national civ
ilization. They are being produced
largely by the work of youthful ap-
prentfces from Washington schools, |
which have vocational courses