# 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:** 14\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2014, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/101 "2014-01-23T05:07:13Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > Kate Winslet is married to some guy named Ned Rocknroll. I’m hoping he’s the only one with that douchetastic last name. Fortunately she named their son Bear Winslet, not Bear Rocknroll. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2014, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/102 "2014-01-23T16:24:10Z")
Come to think of it, if we assume that any last name held by 117 or fewer people isn’t in their database, then they couldn’t possibly have accurate counts for firstname-lastname pairs with those names. Those, they’d have to estimate based on how common the first name is, and assume that any first name held by less than 1 in 117 people (which is most of them) would have only one instance. This would be fine, if first names and last names were associated at random… but they’re not, with juniors and seniors being a case in point. So it’s not surprising to hear that it made a mistake of that sort. ---
**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:** [January 23, 2014, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/103 "2014-01-23T17:49:18Z")
I’m the only US me, and it’s really unsurprising. There are only two or three of me in India. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2014, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/104 "2014-01-23T18:09:44Z")
Since my parents died I am the last in my line with my last name, but there are some possibly distant cousins in Utah and SoCal with the same last name. They seem to be Mormons, so they seem to be having lots of kids. I’m guessing there could be as many as 50 (but probably more like 30) in the US with this name. One of the older generation of those cousins was once on the list of potential successors to the Queen of England, as he was at that time married to a relative of the then Queen Mum. Roddy ---
**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:** [January 23, 2014, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/105 "2014-01-23T18:22:46Z")
> [@susan](#): > > Good to know. I know without looking that I’m the only one with my first+last in the US. I’m fairly certain that my first+last name is globally unique. (My father and grandfather had the same combination, but different middle names, and in any case have passed away.) Oddly, considering the rarity of our last name, several of my brothers and nephews have doppelgangers with the same first name in the two other families that share it. My youngest brother has two: an evangelical minister in New Jersey and a guy in Louisiana convicted of trading illegally with Iran. He doesn’t like the idea of being confused with either of them.:eek: ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2014, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/106 "2014-01-23T19:12:27Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I had a dentist once whose name was Dr. DicKard (note the odd capitalization). Anyone seeing that would be inclined to pronounce it DikKARD (accent on second syllable), I very much suspect. I asked him about it. He said it was a corruption of DesCartes. He thought so; therefore it was. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/107 "2014-01-24T21:13:51Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > I research friends for fun. I had a customer with the last name of Waicukewith. I asked him what nationality was the name and he said Lithuanian. While his ancestors may have come from Lithuania, it’s not a Lithuanian name. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/108 "2014-01-24T22:49:41Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > I research friends for fun. I had a customer with the last name of Waicukewith. I asked him what nationality was the name and he said Lithuanian. > > He and an unmarried daughter are all that exist in the US > [@hibernicus](#): > > While his ancestors may have come from Lithuania, it’s not a Lithuanian name. I really appreciate your input. I was only parroting what he told me. Now that I go back and look at the earlier info I gathered, I think they were Polish or Russian. But you know how butchered names of immigrants were at the turn of the century. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/109 "2014-01-25T23:13:50Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > I really appreciate your input. I was only parroting what he told me. > > Now that I go back and look at the earlier info I gathered, I think they were Polish or Russian. But you know how butchered names of immigrants were at the turn of the century. Lots of people of Polish and Russian ethnicity live in Lithuania, so there’s every chance that what he told you about his family origin is correct. But just looking at the name, it seems like maybe it was originally a Polish or other Slavic name ending in “-wicz” or "-vich"and got changed beyond recognition somewhere along the way. ---
**Author:** ![Elemenopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b5e925/32.png) [@Elemenopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elemenopy)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2014, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/110 "2014-01-26T01:23:07Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > But just looking at the name, it seems like maybe it was originally a Polish or other Slavic name ending in “-wicz” or "-vich"and got changed beyond recognition somewhere along the way. Like Vukicevich? 🙂 My mother’s maiden name is Slavic (starts with a Z, no less) and pretty rare; this website says there were just over 600 of us in the 2000 census: [http://www.americanlastnames.us/](http://www.americanlastnames.us/) [Names with fewer than 100 people in US.](http://www.americanlastnames.us/ranks/rank151601-151671.html) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2014, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/111 "2014-01-26T03:58:09Z")
That site doesn’t have my last name at all. There’s a differently-anglicized version that shows up with 170 individuals, though. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2014, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/112 "2014-01-26T05:47:19Z")
hmmm, website says there are 76 people that share the first and last name as me in the US. However, 99.9% of the people with my first name are female and I’m a male. Given 112,693 people with my first name in the US, that means less than 100 males share my first name and could be significantly less than that. Like today, I went to FedEx to pick up a package that required my signature. The woman working there couldn’t wrap her head around my first name. But said “your last name and address match, so that’s good enough for me.” In the computer age it sucks, because most on line forms are first and last name. However, when someone calls my phone asking for my first name, I know its probably a telemarketer or else a federal agent. So, I have that working for me. I noticed that my 3 daughters also come up with as being 99.9% female names. My wife, using her Chinese first name and my last name, is a unique name in the US. ---
**Author:** ![Isosleepy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/isosleepy/32/479_2.png) [@Isosleepy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isosleepy)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2014, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/113 "2014-01-27T02:16:17Z")
My last name; 4 East of the Rockies (Me, my 2 kids, ex-wife) Another 5 in California, not related until I go 211 years back. ---
**Author:** ![Alba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ea666f/32.png) [@Alba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alba)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2014, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647/114 "2014-01-27T14:02:00Z")
Well, with regards to the rarest I’m a bit out; my last name is among the top 15 most popular names in the US. However, if you include my first name it says there are 4 or fewer. My guess is zero since the combination is quite unique and a Google search only shows me. Note: that I nor my family is from the US and the name combination doesn’t appear in my country of origin either. And I am really curious what rare names people have in this thread. Although, I understand the reluctance to post it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rarest-last-name-in-america/655647.md?page=5)