Hello,
I would like to analyze historical population counts for the city of Kalamazoo (Michigan), ideally back to 1900 and including counts of the white and black population. The Wikipedia page for Kalamazoo includes historical population counts back to 1900, but the cited hyperlink sources don’t go anywhere or are expired: Kalamazoo, Michigan - Wikipedia.
I checked the geographic levels in IPUMS-NHGIS. (1) Is that correct that counties, states, and the nation are the only geographies for which historical counts are available?
(2) If this is the case, does anyone know where I can validate historic decennial counts for cities and possibly retrieve racial composition?
This CB working paper includes historic decennial counts for select large cities in Michigan but does not include Kalamazoo: Historical Census Population Totals, 1790 to 1990 for Large Cities
(3) Could anyone also point me to a resource which provides historical population counts by zip code? I realize this last item might not be possible but thought I would check with this user group.
Thank you!
(1) Is that correct that counties, states, and the nation are the only geographies for which historical counts are available?
(2) If this is the case, does anyone know where I can validate historic decennial counts for cities and possibly retrieve racial composition?
You’ll see on the NHGIS Data Availability page that we also have tract data back to 1910. That said, from 1910 to 1980, tracts cover only selected areas. In the GIS Files section of the Data Availability page, there are links to maps and lists that indicate which areas are covered by tract data in each year. Kalamazoo County first had tracts in 1950.
That summarizes availability via NHGIS. Another source of historical census data is the original print volumes, most of which are available as scanned PDFs through this Census Bureau web page.
Another key source is microdata available through IPUMS USA, which includes identifiers for cities. Kalamazoo is identified in the 1900-1940 full-count microdata and in the 1960 5% sample. It looks likes you wouldn’t be able to get 1950 microdata for Kalamazoo currently. We’re working on processing 1950 full-count microdata that would enable that, but it may some time before that’s available. Until then, you can probably find 1950 counts for Kalamazoo via the Census PDFs.
(3) Could anyone also point me to a resource which provides historical population counts by zip code?
ZIP codes were first defined in 1963, so there couldn’t be original tabulations by ZIP code before that. It’d be possible to estimate historical characteristics for current ZIP codes, but I don’t know of any source that’s done that.
Hello Jonathan,
Thank you very much for your prompt and helpful response!
Sincerely,
Jaclyn
