The U.S. Census Bureau is highlighting the continued importance of the nation's manufacturing industry through a look back at more than two centuries of census data, in recognition of the 15th anniversary of Manufacturing Day on Oct. 2.
In 1810, during the early stages of the Industrial Revolution and two decades after the first U.S. decennial population count, U.S. Marshals were tasked with collecting manufacturing data as part of their census-taking duties, the bureau said. They asked questions on 25 categories of manufactured products and more than 200 types of goods, from tobacco to food.
More than two centuries later, multiple Census Bureau surveys collect data on manufacturing companies and their products, according to the bureau.
The retrospective, published in the bureau's America Counts series, examines the manufacturing sector's contribution to the U.S. economy. The bureau also pointed readers to related reporting on the chemical manufacturing industry, which it said creates commonplace products like medicine, soap and plastics and grew despite an overall manufacturing decline.