Find Data Collections: U.S. Census Data

The purpose of the census and data collection is to provide students/researchers in the social sciences, business and economics easy access to data; and to provide area entrepreneurs and small businesses access to economic data for market research.

The Census & Data Room provides access to print and electronic data such as:

• Demographic data from published censuses and surveys of households and individuals;
• Economic data from published censuses and economic surveys of business organizations;
• Publicly-accessible health and education datasets

Additionally, Milne Library has access to GIS software via the Geneseo Virtual Computer Lab including:

• ESRI ArcGIS
• Minitab
• SPSS 

Connect to a Virtual Lab Computer: 
Use Internet Explorer on Windows, or Safari or Firefox on Mac OS to connect to http://go.geneseo.edu/virtuallab. You will be logged into the virtual lab computer automatically after you authenticate at the virtual lab web page.

Note:  Off campus users will need to connect to campus first via Virtual Private Networking (VPN) see Geneseo VPN Instructions.

Notable Print Resources: 

County and City Data Book (C 3.134/2:C83/2)  Provides in-depth data sets for areas of 100,000 people or more.

Statistical Abstracts of the United Stats (C3.134) Statistical compendium and primary reference source for U.S. statistics.

Woods & Poole State Profile: New York & New Jersey Data and projections through the year 2040 for every county and Metro Area (CD contains tables downloadable in excel). 
 

 Understanding Call Numbers in the Census & Data Room

Census resources in print are organized by a call numbers are issued by the United States Government Printing called SuDoc (which stands for Superintendent of Documents).  

Unlike other items in the library that are grouped by subject, SuDocs are grouped by the government agency that printed the document.  For instance, documents published by the Department of Agriculture begin with A, those published by the Department of Defense begin with D, those published by the Department of Justice begin with J, etc...  The numbers that directly follow  these letters (before the  decimal point) represent the specific office of a particular department.

For example, the call number C 3.134/2:C83/2/947 can be broken down as follows: 

In addition to the links below, often an advanced google search of the Census website is useful.  Simply search Google for your key terms along with site:census.gov. 

Find even more tools and apps at census.gov/data/data-tools.html.

Photographic images from the U.S. census, from 1790 to 2010.  See more on the Census Bureau Website.