My mother worked as a legal secretary for a lawyer in a small town in Louisiana for a couple of years, right out of high school. This would have been in the mid-1930s. In later years, she recalled the legal problems of people who had no birth registration, which was not unusual among older people in that state signing up for social security. She remembered calling on a few residents of the town who "knew everybody" and having them sign affidavits that so-and-so was born in such-and-such a year. That date would then find its way into Social Security records. Of course, if it was off a bit....

George Friedman
Champaign, IL
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Diane Jacobs, Somerset, New Jersey