CULTURE WATCH : Details, Details of 1920 Census

The National Archives took the wraps off the details of the 1920 census this week, permitting a rich, personal look at the statistical birth pangs of urban America.

Seventy-two years after they were filled out, the handwritten census forms were made available to the public on 10,666 rolls of microfilm at the Archives in Washington, D. C., and at regional archives.

While the statistics from the 1920s have been available since shortly after tabulation, the personal data on which they were based--the name, age and background of each household member; their interrelationships, occupations, education, country of origin and so on--are kept confidential by law for 72 years, which was once the average life span.

While every census is a gold mine for researchers, the 1920 poll is particularly rich:

* It was the first census taken after admission of Arizona, the last of the contiguous 48 states.

* It was the first census taken after the twin cataclysms of World War I (116,000 American deaths) and the 1918 influenza epidemic (548,000 American deaths).

* It was the first census to discover more Americans in urban areas (51%) than on farms (49%).

If Congress had reapportioned itself accordingly, 10 rural states would have lost a total of 11 congressional seats to eight urban states. Alarmed at the prospect, Congress refused for the only time in history to reapportion itself on the basis of the most recent census.