Why were the WWII draft registration cards for 1877-1897-born men destroyed for the Southern US?
Why were the WWII draft registration cards for 1877-1897-born men destroyed for a lot of mostly Southern US states? Here is what I'm talking about here: https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/1002/
"The original draft registration cards for the following states were destroyed several years ago and were never microfilmed before they were destroyed. Therefore, there will never be records for these states in this database.
- Alabama
- Florida
- Georgia
- Maine
- Mississippi
- New Mexico
- North Carolina
- South Carolina
- Tennessee"
Why exactly were the relevant WWII draft registration cards for these US states destroyed? Does anyone here know the answer to this question of mine?
Answers
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They may have been destroyed in the 1973 fire at National Personnel Records Center in St Louis. 16-18 million records were lost that had not been microfilmed and there were no duplicate copies.
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Actually, there is a little more detail on these particular draft registration cards at the National Archives' HistoryHub site:
The 4th Registration draft (Old Man’s Draft) cards were scheduled for destruction prior to the 1973 Fire. The following states had already destroyed their collection of this date range before the National Archives took custody of the records:
North Carolina Mississippi Maine
Alabama Florida
Georgia South Carolina
Tennessee New Mexico
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They were destroyed once it was determined the information was not needed.
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So, it was ironically the 1973 fire that saved the Old Man's Draft cards for the other US states?
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Well, it could have been helpful as an aid in verifying the ages of extremely old men (age 107+ and especially age 110+), but the people in charge of this probably didn't realize that.
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Records were not created for the purpose of genealogical research.
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Yes, I'm well-aware of that. I'm just saying that this is an unintended useful side effect of these records' existence. Ditto for the existence of historical US Census entries (the entries themselves, for various people).
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I suppose you could say that. But there are always limitations on how many records an archive can keep, according to the size of its storage, its ability to keep the records safe and the usefulness of the records. As mentioned above, if the records' data is determined to no longer be of value, the records are likely to be destroyed.
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To be fair, the records can be saved on microfilm before they are destroyed. That would save up some space while also allowing the contents of these records to be preserved for posterity. I think that something like this was done for old US Census entries (as in, the actual US Census entries themselves, with people's names, ages, birth places, et cetera).
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Time machine , anyone?
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Good idea! We can save the 1890 US Census entries as well while we're at it lol!
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Interestingly enough, this is what in fact was actually done with some past US Census entries in real life: https://prologue.blogs.archives.gov/2022/02/17/census-records-come-to-the-national-archives/#:~:text=The%201900%E2%80%931970%20censuses%20exist,the%20records%20easier%20to%20transport.
"The 1900–1970 censuses exist only on microfilm—after the Census Bureau made microfilm copies, they often destroyed the originals. Because of the massive volume of material, microfilm was seen as a way of preserving information while at the same time saving storage space, and making the records easier to transport."
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Well, I just invoked that because AFAIK, that's what actually happened to old US Census entries, such as the 1900 US Census entries. What we now see on FS.org are not the actual entries, but microfilm versions of them, with the original (paper) entries being destroyed decades ago based on what I have read.
A time machine would be great! Then we could save the 1890 US Census.
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@DanielGonik Absolutely! One would hope that those records that are no longer kept have been microfilmed (or digitized in these modern times). The censuses are a good example of that. Speaking of the 1890 census...while it did get burned, the remaining remnants were actually put on the destruction list and destroyed rather than microfilming prior to doing so. Huge contrast with the 1973 fire where they did everything possible (and still are) to retrieve the original records and rebuild the lost information.
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While we all lament that most of the remnants of the 1890 census were destroyed, it is understandable. Much of what remained was watersoaked. The techniques available for restoration or conservation in 1921, when the 1890 was burned, compared to those available in 1973, when the St Louis fire occurred, were very different.
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"The techniques available for restoration or conservation in 1921, when the 1890 was burned, compared to those available in 1973, when the St Louis fire occurred, were very different."
And both are a world away from what people are working on now: they've read part of a 2000-year-old carbonized papyrus scroll from Herculaneum (https://scrollprize.org/grandprize). Without actually touching it. And they're confident that they'll be able to read the rest, eventually.
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Worth noting that there is an 1891 book published with the 1890 US Census results for Northampton County, Pennsylvania: https://www.masthof.com/products/northampton-county-pa-everything-collection
"1890 Census Directory of Northampton County (Eleventh U.S. Census) Also Directory of Phillipsburg, N.J. (Joseph H. Werner, 1891, 644 pages)"
There is a free version of its contents available online here: https://www.bethlehempaonline.com/beth1890/communities.html
It's just one US county, but there was a future verified 119-year-old living in the county as a child back then, specifically 10-year-old (well, actually 9-year-old, but her age was rounded upwards) Sarah D. Clark, later known as Sarah Knauss after her marriage: https://www.bethlehempaonline.com/beth1890/abc.html
Here's her family specifically: "Clark Walter 41, carpenter--Amelia 33, Charles H 12, Sarah D 10, Foster E 1. 524 Broad"
She died on December 30, 1999 at age 119: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Knauss
Quite a miracle that at least the 1890 US Census results for that single Pennsylvania county were preserved in book form.
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BTW, this might seem like a stupid alternate history question, but I'll ask it here anyway: Do you think that the 1890 US Census returns would have still eventually been destroyed in a fire sooner or later had World War I not broken out back in 1914? I'm primarily applying the logic of the butterfly effect here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect
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Yep, I saw and read about that!
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@Julia Szent-Györgyi and the work being carried out by archivists in Ireland, with the remnants saved from the Four Courts in 1922, are beyond amazing. Packed away for nearly 100 years and coming back to life.
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Very sad about how a lot of Irish historical records were destroyed in that fire: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Courts
"On 14 April 1922, the courts complex was occupied by IRA forces opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty, with Rory O'Connor acting as their spokesman. On 28 June the new National Army attacked the building to dislodge the "rebels", on the orders of the Minister for Defence Richard Mulcahy, authorised by President of Dáil Éireann Arthur Griffith.[14] This attack provoked a week of fighting in Dublin. In the process of the bombardment, the historic building was destroyed. The west wing of the building was obliterated in a huge explosion, destroying the Irish Public Record Office at the rear of the building. Nearly a thousand years of archives were destroyed by this explosion, the ensuing fire, and the water poured onto the fire.[15]"
AFAIK, a lot of Irish historical census records were also lost in that 1922 fire.
Let's hope that the revival project currently going on will be successful: https://www.irishcentral.com/roots/history/seven-centuries-irish-public-records
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Apparently now familysearch.org has the WWII draft cards publicly available, or at least most of them, at least for those men who were born in the early 20th century. This is excellent news!
Great job in regards to this, and thank you very much!
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The fourth draft appears to be in two nationwide collections now:
Browsable images only, although the text talks about a "name index"; men age 45-64: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1339071
Search and browsable images, again for men age 45-64: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1861144
In addition, typing "II Draft" into the Find A Collection box on the Search - Records landing page lists 39 states plus the Virgin Islands that have WWII draft card collections. Some of them don't have browsable images, but the records do have images attached (e.g. California: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/2786603), while others have both index and browsable images (e.g. Pennsylvania: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/2603579). All of the ones I looked at specified that these state-specific collections do not include the fourth draft.
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Do you know if there are any draft registration cards available for US men for the Korean War and/or Vietnam War, either online or somewhere offline but with the potential of them being downloaded online in the future?
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This might help answer your question, @DanielGonik
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I only know what the Internet tells me about U.S. records of any sort, military or otherwise. Sorry.
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