Taking the Census

Francis William Edmonds

1854 · Oil on canvas · The American Wing

The United States Census of 1850 initiated the requirement that heads of households provide information about each of their dependents. The new regulation caused a good deal of confusion. Edmonds’s humorous image, which is the earliest known portrayal of the census-taking process, features a father’s painstaking efforts to recall his family statistics, while several of his children hide from sight. The small framed portrait of George Washington above the mantel evokes not only the genesis of the country’s political system but also the legendary admonition never to tell a lie. The carefully lit interior and wealth of detail in the composition were inspired, in part, by earlier Dutch genre scenes.

Artist

Francis William Edmonds

Date

1854

Medium

Oil on canvas

Culture

American

Department

The American Wing

Credit line

Gift of Diane, Daniel, and Mathew Wolf, in honor of John K. Howat and Lewis I. Sharp, 2006