# Rarest last name in America **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 14, 2013, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647 "2013-04-14T00:46:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/41 "2013-04-15T04:28:20Z")
There is nobody in the US with my last name who didn’t descend from my father; there are roughly 12 of us now, though. ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/42 "2013-04-15T05:14:37Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > There are 22 Hitlers listed in the WhitePages, including seven Adolfs. Yes, but I don’t believe these are real Hitlers. Can you not put any name down that you want to show up in the white pages? sort of like picking the name that comes up on caller ID? I am hard pressed to believe that anyone is actually walking around with the moniker Adolph Hitler. But if anyone has any real data, I am interested. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/43 "2013-04-15T05:16:12Z")
> [@the\_diego](#): > > I remember a category in the Guinness. The rarest contrived name was Zachary ZZZZ\_\_\_\_. There were four Z’s at the start of his last name. He wanted his name to appear at the bottom of the phone listing. Was he drinking the Guinness when he came up with the name? ---
**Author:** ![the\_diego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/44 "2013-04-15T05:18:30Z")
Wrong qualif. I meant “most contrived name,” so it doesn’t necessarily answer the OP. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/45 "2013-04-15T07:16:19Z")
> [@FluffyBob](#): > > My Step Father’s surname is Gremo, he emigrated to Canada from England in 1959, leaving behind a sister who married and took an new name. He has two adult sons, one in Toronto, the other in Beijing, my mother who took his name making for three Gremos in Canada. > > Occasional searches have never found any other Gremos in North America or England. . [http://howmanyofme.com/](http://howmanyofme.com/) says 127 Gremo’s in the USA. This is from Census information, which is most likely the best source. [ancestry.com](http://ancestry.com) can find some in Italy and London, historically. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/46 "2013-04-15T07:21:35Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > It says 117 people with my father’s last name. > > 1161 with my stepfather’s. [Referring to the link to “How Many of Me” posted by **drew870mitchell** up-thread.] It seems like 117 is the magic minimum it gives for any name. I tried Obama there. It said “fewer than 117”. I also tried Nakonecznyj. It said “fewer than 117”. Mxyzptlk? Fewer than 117. Btfsplk? Fewer than 117. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/47 "2013-04-15T07:32:30Z")
> [@Raygun99](#): > > Wow. By a weird coincidence I knew a family growing up that had a variant spelling of that last name (all girls though, so so much for that). (Referring to Nakonecznyj, I think.) How did they pronounce that? ---
**Author:** ![sandra\_nz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@sandra\_nz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sandra_nz)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/48 "2013-04-15T11:10:14Z")
Yep, I get 117 on my surname as well. ---
**Author:** ![Raygun99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Raygun99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raygun99)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/49 "2013-04-15T13:19:07Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > (Referring to Nakonecznyj, I think.) > > How did they pronounce that? nak-uh-NASH-nee. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/50 "2013-04-15T14:12:22Z")
My surname is geographic and derives from a village in western India that hasn’t existed for more than a 100 years, so there aren’t very many of us. There are also a couple of different ways to transliterate it from Modi or Devangari script so there are even less of us, as it were. In the US, there are 23 of us, including my wife and I. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/51 "2013-04-15T15:15:05Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > [Referring to the link to “How Many of Me” posted by **drew870mitchell** up-thread.] > > It seems like 117 is the magic minimum it gives for any name. I tried Obama there. It said “fewer than 117”. I also tried Nakonecznyj. It said “fewer than 117”. > > Mxyzptlk? Fewer than 117. > > Btfsplk? Fewer than 117. Then it’s a bullshit site, I’m thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Silver\_Tyger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Silver\_Tyger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silver_Tyger)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/52 "2013-04-15T15:26:29Z")
As far as I can tell, I’m the only person in the world with my surname. When I changed my name, I made up something that sounded real. I assumed from how normal it looks that someone out there would already have it. From googling it, it looks like some people might have it as a first name. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/53 "2013-04-15T16:19:54Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > Yes, but I don’t believe these are real Hitlers. Can you not put any name down that you want to show up in the white pages? sort of like picking the name that comes up on caller ID? > > I am hard pressed to believe that anyone is actually walking around with the moniker Adolph Hitler. But if anyone has any real data, I am interested. Besides the WhitePages, I checked and some of these names appear in other directories like the regular phone directories and LinkedIn. While it’s possible that some of the Adolfs are Neo-Nazis or White Supremacists, I don’t see any reason that people like Sue Hitler, Jennifer Hitler, or Selvan Hitler made their names up. Some people want to keep their family names despite bad associations. And even if these names are not their original names, they still exist as names in the US. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/54 "2013-04-15T16:50:41Z")
> [@flodnak](#): > > None, but I used to know quite a few Zimmermanns. Pennsylvania, you know. (Also Youngs and Yoders.) > > Searches have indicated that if there are at most a handful of people with my last name in the US who are not descendants of my paternal grandfather. Since he had two sons, who have between them five descendants who both 1) live in the US and 2) still use that last name, that makes it a quite rare surname in the US. In Germany and Austria, it appears to be uncommon, but not freakishly rare. I know a Kandolf. ---
**Author:** ![Aman27deep](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ebca7d/32.png) [@Aman27deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aman27deep)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2013, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/55 "2013-04-15T21:31:53Z")
I might have one of them - Sohal. ---
**Author:** ![SandyHook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dec6dc/32.png) [@SandyHook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SandyHook)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2013, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/56 "2013-04-16T05:27:54Z")
[quote=“flodnak, post:30, topic:655647”] None, but I used to know quite a few Zimmermanns. Pennsylvania, you know. (Also Youngs and Yoders.) QUOTE] Zimmermann, in German, is carpenter. So it’s another one of those occupational names like Baker, Porter, etc. I would expect it to be fairly common. Not all occupations equally well lend themselves to names. I don’t suspect there are a lot of John Proctologist’s out there. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2013, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/57 "2013-04-16T06:17:51Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Besides the WhitePages, I checked and some of these names appear in other directories like the regular phone directories and LinkedIn. While it’s possible that some of the Adolfs are Neo-Nazis or White Supremacists, I don’t see any reason that people like Sue Hitler, Jennifer Hitler, or Selvan Hitler made their names up. Some people want to keep their family names despite bad associations. And even if these names are not their original names, they still exist as names in the US. Or they have a spelling error thing occuring - when writing Hittler , the result was Hitler. There are for more spelt Hittler … You can see how a spelling error may occur post Adolph… There are many more spelt Hiedler.. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2013, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/58 "2013-04-16T12:59:01Z")
> [@Isilder](#): > > Or they have a spelling error thing occuring - when writing Hittler , the result was Hitler. There are for more spelt Hittler … You can see how a spelling error may occur post Adolph… There are many more spelt Hiedler.. Or spell it Schicklgruber. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2013, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/59 "2013-04-17T12:29:28Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > I am hard pressed to believe that anyone is actually walking around with the moniker Adolph Hitler. But if anyone has any real data, I am interested. If personal attestation is real data, then [I have it](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8954818&postcount=26). If that’s not good enough for you, then hie thee to Meghalaya, the region of India where the student in my story was probably from. Naming your child after historical figures is extremely popular there; there are even Hitlers, Stalins, and Napoleons in the state legislature. Some of these people evidently end up immigrating to North America. ---
**Author:** ![Svejk\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@Svejk\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Svejk_1)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2013, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/60 "2013-04-17T14:52:09Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Since the letters X,Y,and Z are the rarest letters in the English language, I would expect that surnames starting with these to be rare. How many “Zeltzers” do you know? I know zero Zeltzers, but that is completely irrelevant. What you are saying is logically as well as empirically flawed - frequency of a letter in all words, frequency of letters starting words, and frequency of individual words with certain starting letters are three completely different things. This [wiki site](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_frequency) is pretty helpful, but look [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_common_words_in_English) for some info on common words. The top ten letters in the English language are E, T, A, O, I, S, N, H, R - but the top ten word starting letters are T, A, S, H, W, I, O, B, M, F. An additional complicating factor is that last names are far more likely than regular words to come from other languages, in which letter frequencies are completely different (also discussed on the wiki page) Lastly, you’re wrong about the Y. It’s far more abundant than Q, J, K, and V, for instance. As for the OP’s question - given that names occasionally disappear completely, the answer is probably going to be some name that only one person has. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647.md?page=4)