Daily AncestorRetired
Retired in a census means the person had stopped working, and often names the former line of work, as in retired merchant.
The 1870 and 1880 instructions told enumerators to write retired lawyer or retired merchant for people who had left business. That gives you the person's earlier career.
The 1910 and 1920 instructions reversed course: a retired person should not be given their former trade, but listed as own income or none. So the same person may be described quite differently from one census to the next.
As seen in a recordOccupation column of the 1870 to 1940 census
Ezra Hunt, 71, Retired merchant, Conn.
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "Retired." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/occupations/retired. Last checked 2026-10-01.