(MSNBC) Americans now may plug family names into an online 1940 U.S. census and come up with details about the lives of New Yorkers — from Joe DiMaggio and Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy to their own relatives.
Previously, users had to provide exact addresses from seven decades ago to look for a New York connection.
With names, free searches (with an Ancestry.com free account) of the 1940 U.S. census first made public in April unlock personal information about residents of New York — then the largest U.S. state and an immigrant hub from which people moved all over the country.