The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 82, July 1978 - April, 1979 Page: 353
496 p. : ill. (some col.), ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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A small farmer's home. All illustrations are from Harper's New Monthly
Magazine. Courtesy Library, University of Texas at Austin.
A85os and in the Civil War. Even when the investigation is restricted
in this way, "antebellum Texas" still consisted of an area about the size
of Alabama and Mississippi combined.
The data for this study of Texas farming were collected in two ran-
dom samples of the United States census returns. The first included
approximately 5,oo00o Texas families from the manuscript census of 1850,
and the second, another 5,000ooo families from the same source for 186o.4
Data were collected for sample families from each of three census sched-
4Samples of 5,000 were used because this number is large enough to reduce sampling
error to near zero. The sample was taken at random by first arranging the counties in
random order and then using computer-generated lists of random numbers to determine
which families should be included in the sample. For example, the first county in the
random ordering of counties in 1850 was Upshur, and the first number in the list was five.
Therefore, the procedure was to turn through the free population census for Upshur
County until the fifth family was reached, whereupon basic information was gathered on
the head of household in that family. This process continued through all counties and all
5,ooo numbers for 1850o and then was repeated for 186o. Thus, the samples were random
and unbiased in that every family in antebellum Texas had an equal chance of being3-73-
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 82, July 1978 - April, 1979, periodical, 1978/1979; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101206/m1/415/: accessed March 29, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.