In the United States page of The Family History Guide, there are two Goals related to census research—C1: Census Records, and C2: By Decades. The “By Decades” Goal has links to great articles and videos for each decade of the U.S. census, from 1940 back to 1790, to help you locate your ancestors in census records.

What you may not know is that there are some great additional tools to help you with your research, such as worksheets, census headings, and questions that were asked by census takers. The worksheets and census heading information in Goal C2 is from the FamilySearch Wiki, while the questions asked by decade are from the U.S. Census site.

Below is a list of these resources by decade, for your reference. Be sure to check out the Goals in The Family History Guide for assistance with your research. For help with census records in other countries, see the corresponding page in the Countries menu and then go to the Census or Civil Registration Goal.

Census Headings

• 1940
• 1870-1930
• 1790-1860

Census Worksheets

• 1940
• 1930
• 1920
• 1910
• 1900
• 1880
• 1870
• 1860
• 1850
• 1840/1830
• 1820
• 1810/1800
• 1790 

Questions Asked for Each Census

Go to the Index of Questions page on the U.S. Census site. In the table on the left side, select a decade to display the questions that were asked in that particular census.

We hope you enjoy working with the U.S. census tools available in The Family History Guide! You can also use the free Goldie May Chrome extension to assist you in your research strategies with the census. See the Goldie May page under Project 4: Discover