Of the Dawsons whose literacy was recorded, 80.5% could both read and write, 3.7% could read but not write, and 15.8% could do neither. Women came out slightly ahead, 81.5% reading and writing against 79.4% of men. Bear in mind these figures include young children; the census itself only counted people aged nine and over when calculating illiteracy, on the grounds that it was unfair to label a child illiterate before they'd had a chance to learn.