# Are There Any White People Named 'Washington'? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 7, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357 "2006-02-07T06:04:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2006, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/21 "2006-02-07T23:48:57Z")
“Urban” being used a euphemistic black racial descriptor is pretty well documented. You can’t ignore that fact that “pop,” “rock” “goth” and “techno” not generally listed as urban music forms but “rap”, “R&B” and “neo-soul” are. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/22 "2006-02-08T00:26:27Z")
> [@Askia](#): > > You can’t ignore that fact that “pop,” “rock” “goth” and “techno” not generally listed as urban music forms but “rap”, “R&B” and “neo-soul” are. Nobody’s ignoring it, we’re just bitching about how it’s an abuse of language. I think I understand how it came to be used this way: “Urban” is an antonym for “Country,” and you don’t get much whiter than “country” music. It’s _those_ guys who committed the first offense – there’s very little that’s rural about Nashville or the “country” music that’s produced there. Outside of the U.S., “urban music” means what you’d expect it to mean, and includes everything from techno, house and drum&bass to jazz to hip-hop. The kind of stuff that gets played in _any_ sort of cosmopolitan club, as opposed to the more provincial sounds that the unsophisticated rubes in the suburbs and backwaters groove to. (Ouch! Stop!) If we need to pigeonhole classes of music into quasi-racist phyla, why not just be direct about it, instead of being cryptic and using a term that has another meaning which is both intrinsic and useful? It’s irksome. ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/23 "2006-02-08T00:37:49Z")
I think the tangent is way wide of the mark. Urban music may or may not refer to black music. That’s beside the point. Urban \*\*legend \*\* is a completely different term having nothing to do with race. The best I can explain it is “popular misinformation”. It includes things like alligators in the sewer, putting cats in the microwave, babysitter on pot putting the baby in the oven & the turkey in the crib, and all kinds of “it happened to a friend of a friend” stories. ---
**Author:** ![nerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@nerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nerd)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/24 "2006-02-08T01:00:08Z")
> [@Case Sensitive](#): > > Washington Irving. You might have missed the “last name” part of the question… 🙂 > [@Surreal](#): > > I’ve noticed that while it is quite common for black people to have the last name ‘Washington’… ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/25 "2006-02-08T05:32:46Z")
> [@Harriet the Spry](#): > > Urban \*\*legend \*\* is a completely different term having nothing to do with race. The best I can explain it is “popular misinformation”. Auughh!!! Yes to the first part, but then no no no no no no no. “Urban legend” is a 20th-century term, coined by folklorists once they realized that legend (a type of folk narrative) existed among modern, urban, educated, first-world people just as much as among rural and less-educated people. It was popularized as a term by Jan Brunvand. Since then, folklorists have largely supplanted the term with “contemporary legend” (as **Chronos** mentioned) or just “legend.” Meanly, the general population has kept it and even added the monstrous hybrid term “urban myth.” The thing is, to be a legend, there has to be a story. A belief or a misconception or summary of a story cannot, technically, be a legend, urban or otherwise. The story about alligators in the sewer is a legend; “there are alligators in the sewers” is a statement of belief, to be sent to the Straight Dope for verification. [crawls off soapbox] ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/26 "2006-02-08T05:51:23Z")
The 1930 U.S. census had 1,049 heads-of-household with the surname Washington who were white. Alabama, 43 Arizona, 6 Arkansas, 28 California, 42 Colorado, 7 Connecticut, 8 Delaware, 2 District of Columbia, 15 Florida, 29 Georgia, 78 Idaho, 3 Illinois, 13 etc. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/27 "2006-02-08T05:57:18Z")
> [@Larry Mudd](#): > > “Urban” is an antonym for “Country,” and you don’t get much whiter than “country” music. How about rock music. Any major black rock acts in the last twenty years? ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/28 "2006-02-08T06:43:04Z")
> [@](#): > > Any major black rock acts in the last twenty years? Lenny Kravitz, Local H, Ice T / Body Count (“Cop Killer” was _not_ a rap song), Skunk Anansie, Prince, Fishbone, Living Color, Suicidal Tendencies… ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/29 "2006-02-08T06:53:34Z")
Living Color has been MIA the last twenty years. Of the others, only Lenny Kravitz and Prince and be conisdered both major and _rock_ acts. ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/30 "2006-02-08T07:02:58Z")
> [@yBeayf](#): > > Lenny Kravitz, Local H, Ice T / Body Count (“Cop Killer” was _not_ a rap song), Skunk Anansie, Prince, Fishbone, Living Color, Suicidal Tendencies… Suicidal Tendencies and Local H have or have had black people in them, but I don’t know if they’d really be black rock acts. The primary creative forces in both bands are white boys. ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/31 "2006-02-08T07:13:04Z")
> [@yBeayf](#): > > Lenny Kravitz, Local H, Ice T / Body Count (“Cop Killer” was _not_ a rap song), Skunk Anansie, Prince, Fishbone, Living Color, Suicidal Tendencies… Bad Brains. ---
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 7:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/32 "2006-02-08T07:43:36Z")
> [@](#): > > Living Color has been MIA the last twenty years. Of the others, only Lenny Kravitz and Prince and be conisdered both major and rock acts. Continuing the hijack… **Living Colour** released an album, [Collideoscope](http://www.cduniverse.com/sresult.asp?HT_Search=Title&HT_Search_Info=collideoscope&B1=Find+it&frm=lk_lcsite), in 2003 and toured extensively. Critically acclaimed, but not a huge commercial success. But hard rock tends to be a niche market, methinks. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/33 "2006-02-08T16:08:57Z")
And are there any white people called Winston? (apart from the Churchill dynasty, that is) ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/34 "2006-02-08T16:15:07Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > The 1930 U.S. census had 1,049 heads-of-household with the surname Washington who were white. > > Alabama, 43 > Arizona, 6 > Arkansas, 28 > California, 42 > Colorado, 7 > Connecticut, 8 > Delaware, 2 > District of Columbia, 15 > Florida, 29 > Georgia, 78 > Idaho, 3 > Illinois, 13 > > etc. Wow, that is really rare. Does it say how many black ones there were? It must have been many times that. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/35 "2006-02-08T16:19:16Z")
The 1903 U.S. census has 898 heads-of-household with the surname Winston who are white. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/36 "2006-02-08T16:24:06Z")
The 1930 U.S. census has the following heads-of-household with the surname Washington and these racial classifications: Negro: 14,378 Colored: 58 Mulatto: 0 For the surname Winston: Negro: 1,297 Colored: 4 Mulatto: 0 ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/37 "2006-02-08T16:36:38Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > The 1903 U.S. census has 898 heads-of-household with the surname Winston who are white. I meant 1930, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/38 "2006-02-08T17:39:02Z")
So the answer to the OP seems to be that there are whites in the U.S. named “Washington”, but they are outnumbered by blacks with that name by a little more than 14 to 1. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/39 "2006-02-08T20:17:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Living Color has been MIA the last twenty years. They won their Grammy in 1989. That’s less than twenty years ago. ---
**Author:** ![she\_sells\_sea\_snails](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea5d25/32.png) [@she\_sells\_sea\_snails](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/she_sells_sea_snails)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2006, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357/40 "2006-02-08T21:00:01Z")
I couldn’t follow those census answers. Were there more or less white than black Washington families in 1930? And how many white or black Lincoln families? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-white-people-named-washington/343357.md?page=3)