Information Technology and Organizational Change in the British Census, 1801–1911

The first British census was taken in 1801 and was processed by a handful of clerks in a tiny office. By the mid-1800s, the census had evolved into an elaborate Victorian data-processing operation involving over a hundred clerks, each of whom had a specialized information-processing role. In 1911 the census was mechanized and the routine data processing was taken over by punched-card machines.

This paper explores the changes in information technology within the census over a period of more than a century, and the resulting organizational changes. A contrast is drawn with the U.S. census—which mechanized in 1890—on the adoption of new technology.