A – Announcing 1950!

This is my ninth year of blogging the A to Z Challenge. Everyday I will share something about my family’s life during 1950. This was a year that the USA federal census was taken and the first one that I appear in. At the end of each post I will share a book from my childhood collection.

Me in 1950, arms spread in the backyard on Union street.

Amazingly, the 1950 Census will be the first one I will personally appear in! I have spent years looking through old census records and trying to piece together the lives of my Ancestors. When I realized that the 1950 census would be released on April 1 this year, I was pretty excited that now I would get to see what picture the census gives of a year I know. Although I was only three when that census was taken in April, 1950, I remember and I recall those days. Sort of. With the help of news articles and photographs I will go through my family’s life in 1950 during this A to Z Challenge.

Although the news items show that my family was active and aware of what was happening at the time, I was blissfully unaware as I lived my young life. I was living through that simpler time everyone remembers as the past, but the adults were living through lives that were as complex as any. And so it goes.

A poem I wrote six years ago about this photo.

I was almost four
 swirling
in the backyard. My
life beginning.

August 2016 sitting at my 
desk
writing
listening to Sati. The 
ceiling fan creaks
around my husband's voice on
the phone.

Outside cars pass.
A Year on the Farm

19 thoughts on “A – Announcing 1950!

  1. I am looking forward to following this challenge. I love the idea of sharing books!

  2. How lucky you made the census… I have to wait another 10 years. hope I make it. LOL What a cute photo of you. I’m also back for another ride in the A to Z
    Jeanne

    1. I was anxious to make it too. I think I’ll write out the rest of the censuses I appear in just in case I don’t make it to their unveiling or am not able to search etc.
      I will be visiting you!

  3. It will be interesting to read about life for you in the US during the 50s. We’re a similar age and I too would be on a 1950 census…if Australia kept and published ours.
    That photo of you is so cute and you look so happy and carefree.

    1. It’s sad that Australia destroyed the censuses. They are so interesting even if when you were actually there, you know much more than they ever tell.

      Yes so happy and carefree. Wish I could get that feeling back right now!

  4. Ooh, this is a great A-Z! I am so here for the books…and the pictures of small Kristin…and…and oh, everything you will write about your family!

  5. I look forward to learning more about your and your family’s life in the decade. Definitely looking back to childhood it seems a simpler time but as you say it was not necessarily so for the adults.

  6. Here I am, Kristin! Late, but here! 🙂

    Oh, I love that photo of you!

    It must indeed be kind of odd (but also exciting) to find yourself on papers the likes of which you workd so much on. I’mexcited for you!

    @JazzFeathers
    The Old Shelter – Enter the New Woman

  7. I love your happy dance photo at age 3! I was just 2 months old when the census taker called in 1950 — but I was just as thrilled as you to discover myself for the first time in the records I have used for decades to explore my ancestry. Good luck with A to Z this year. Hope to stop back during the month!

  8. I love your poem. Yes, when we’re little we have no idea (hopefully) of the troubles our parents and other adults face. If we’re lucky, it’s the time of innocence.

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