Locating the victims: the nonrole of punched card technology and census work

Abstract

This article is designed to provide information regarding the development of punched card technology for use in both census and commercial applications. After describing the different types of technology and how they were used, this article provides a detailed description of census requirementsand, in particular, the German censuses of 1925, 1933, and 1939-in an effort to counter arguments that German authorities used the results of these censuses during the Holocaust period. Extensive references are provided to enable others to have access to information from that era.

IBM and Germany 1922–1941

“…When census workers found someone who was Jewish, they used a special, separate card that noted the person's birthplace. These cards were not processed with the standard census information, but were handled separately (Kisterman, 1997). The success of Dehomag's census contract led to additional work scheduling the German railroads.…”