Changing Population of Sweden, Maine



 "It has been hypothesized that the Civil Was was a major watershed for our part of Maine. Sure, many young men did not make it back home alive, but many others traveled to other parts of the country and saw that elsewhere there was land without rocks, often flat land that was as fertile as the Fryeburg intervale. Curiously, it may not have mattered so much that we have long winters, because a lot of that early out-migration went to Ohio and Minnesota, among other destinations."
- Richard Lyman (remarks at the annual luncheon of the Hobbs Library in Lovell, Maine, June 30, 2013)

People of Sweden

The following links provide transcribed lists and actual images of the US census taken in Sweden between the years 1820 (the first census year after Sweden's separation from Lovell in 1813) and 1940 (the latest year for which census data became public).  Data for two years are missing. The first, 1850, is not included here because Sweden was combined with Denmark and Waterford in that census. Most of the records for the 1890 census were destroyed in 1921 as a result of a fire in the Commerce Building where they were stored. The actual story of the fate of the 1890 census records is an interesting one as described in this publication.

As shown, only male heads of households are listed by name in the censuses of 1820 through 1840. On the actual census forms for these years (see below), other members of the household are enumerated by age group. 

Of interest is the names that persist from 1820 to the present - as names of descendants or places: 
Trull, Flint, Haskell, Kneeland, Webber, Woodbury, Plummer, Nevers, and others.

Transcribed Census Files for 1820 through 1940 (exceptions noted above)

Note that these files were transcribed by others, so there may be many transcription errors. Send corrections to me.

Images of Actual Census Forms for 1820 through 1940 (exceptions noted above)

Note that images are about 1.5 Mb each. Some census years may have several images. 

Data Sources

Files for 1880 through 1930 downloaded from ancestry.com (a subscription service).

Files for 1940 downloaded from the national archives.

By law, census records are confidential for a period of 72 years; 1940 is the latest available.