Single parenthood in the past: Canadian census categories, 1891-1951, and the "normal" family.

Abstract

Anna Cottle was a 56-year-old widow living in St. John’s Ward, Toronto, in 1901. She and her two teenage daughters, Edith and Ellen, lived in the household of carpenter and widower William Wilkinson and his two sons. Anna was listed as a lodger, Edith and Ellen as her daughters. Another two families were also listed as lodgers and, like Anna, were given no separate family number in the manuscript census.’ Susan Mitchell (36) was listed as a lodger in the dwelling of a barber, Hugh Mitchell (43 , his wife, and their two children. Susan was inscribed as married, though her husband was not listed. Her 15-year-old son, Willie, lived with here2 Annie Tamousegusick, a 40-year-old Chippewan widow, lived in Nipissing County in the Nairn District when the enumerator visited her family in 1901. Her 24-year-old trapper son, George, was listed as family head, her other children as his brothers and sister^.^