Now What? Wondering About Welfare

Q. On March 23, 1937, my grandmother received a letter from Logan County, Ark., welfare, stating that they wanted her to care for her father, Scott Massey. Arkansas has no death records of him, I have no names for his parents and Grandma didn’t know who her mother was, as her father raised her. Did Social Security go back that far, and how can I find any welfare records?

A. Yes, early Arkansas death registrations are limited. The state’s welfare records from the 1930s and 1940s no longer exist. When Social Security cards were first issued in late 1936, people eligible to participate were primarily industrial workers. If Scott Massey retired before Jan. 1, 1937, or worked in a rural county such as Logan, he probably didn’t have a Social Security number and the accompanying application. (Here’s more information on finding ancestors’ Social Security applications.)

From the June 2002 Family Tree Magazine