Old age in the United States, 1900

Social conditions of older Americans in the early 20th century are examined in this survey. Family structure was emphasized using national samples of the non-institutionalized population in 1900. The 1900 sample provides ecological characteristics including attributes of counties and occupational and ethnic characteristics of other heads on sampled census pages. These data were collected from a stratified sample of 56 counties, excluding cities of 25,000, and 44 urban PSUs. Persons sampled were drawn from clusters defined by manuscript census page. Cities over 25,000 were triple-sampled. The data for the 1900 sample are contained in one data file in card-image format. The sample of the non-institutionalized population ages 55 to 64 has 2,000 cases and for age 65 and older there are 3,000 cases.