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Most Popular Surnames in the United States

In the 2020 Census, over 235 million people reported they were White alone or in combination with another race group, such as Black or African American. The alone or in any combination population includes those who reported one or more responses to the race question such as only Austrian or Austrian and German or Austrian and Asian. The alone population includes those who reported only one response to the race question, such as Austrian. As a result, data are now available from the decennial census for 104 detailed White groups, including Lithuanian, Irish, Libyan, Syrian, Pennsylvania Dutch and Australian.

Library Data

As our country’s demographics change and the nation becomes more multiracial, it’s important to understand the composition of the race alone and race alone or in any combination populations. These multiple measures of diversity complement the 2020 Census redistricting data release and enable us to explore the richness and complexity of our nation’s population in a new light. The White alone non-Hispanic population was the most prevalent racial or ethnic group for all states except California (Hispanic or Latino), Hawaii (Asian alone non-Hispanic), New Mexico (Hispanic or Latino), and the District of Columbia, a state equivalent (Black or African American alone non-Hispanic).
There is more variation in the map for the second-most prevalent racial or ethnic group. Figures 2 and 3 show the most and second-most prevalent racial or ethnic groups by county in 2020. In West Virginia, the Multiracial non-Hispanic population (4.0%) became the second-most prevalent group, surpassing the Black or African American alone non-Hispanic population (3.6%). This calculation tells us how diverse and “diffused” the population is relative to the largest groups.
In addition, we decided to continue using this racial and ethnic cross-tabulation because it is commonly used by the Census Bureau and other data users. These diversity calculations require the use of mutually exclusive racial and ethnic (nonoverlapping) categories. The overall racial and ethnic diversity of the country has increased since 2010, according to U.S. Today’s companion America Counts story on the overview of race and ethnicity explains that differences in overall racial distributions are largely due to design improvements in the two separate questions for race data collection and processing, as well as some demographic changes over the past 10 years.

Census Records: A Window to History

Similarly, we do not see the same large increase in the Multiracial non-Hispanic population from 2010 to 2020 using these cross-tabulated categories. This is because the vast majority (94%) of responses to the race question that are classified as Some Other Race alone are from people of Hispanic or Latino origin identifying as “Mexican,” “Latino” and other Hispanic origin groups. We know that cross tabulating the race and Hispanic origin categories yields a relatively small Some Other Race alone non-Hispanic population. The 1997 OMB standards emphasize that people of Hispanic origin may be of any race. The improvements and updates enabled a more thorough and accurate depiction of how people self-identify, yielding a more accurate portrait of how people report their Hispanic origin and race within the context of a two-question format.

Data

The largest German alone population was in Pennsylvania — 1,112,662, or 11.4% of the state’s White alone population. Texas had the largest English alone population (over 2.1 million) (Table 1). The German alone population was the largest in 10 states, the Italian alone population in four, and the Irish alone population only in Massachusetts. The English alone population was the largest detailed White group nationally, in 35 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. French Canadian and Canadian were the two largest detailed groups in the “Other White” population, with their alone or in any combination populations each exceeding half a million.
By fall, 11.1% of households with school-age children reported homeschooling (Sept. 30-Oct. 12). In the first week (April 23-May 5) of Phase 1 of the Household Pulse Survey, about 5.4% of U.S. households with school-aged children reported homeschooling . It’s clear that in an unprecedented environment, families are seeking solutions that will reliably meet their health and safety needs, their childcare needs and the learning and socio-emotional needs of their children. The content on this page includes a link to a non-government website.
Get an alert directly in your inbox to read, share and blog about our newest stories. For more information on how the Census Bureau collects, codes and tabulates statistics on Hispanic or Latino origin and race, explore our 2020 Census subject definitions pages and the 2020 Census Redistricting Technical Documentation. Get tips and tricks on how to access, visualize and use Census Bureau data. In contrast, the District of Columbia’s Black or African American alone non-Hispanic population was 50.0% and the White alone non-Hispanic population was 34.8% in 2010, a difference of 15.2 percentage points.
The addition of a new write-in area for collecting detailed White responses was one of the improvements made to the 2020 Census race question design. Among those who identified as White alone or in combination, English (46.6 million), German (45 million), and Irish (38.6 million) were the largest groups. Together, the English (46.6 million), German (45 million), and Irish (38.6 million) alone or in any combination populations made up over half of the White alone or in combination population in 2020. For the first time ever, respondents to the 2020 Census who reported White as a race could write in more details such as Italian, Palestinian or Cajun. Reimbursable surveys conducted for the National Center for Education Statistics—like the National Teacher and Principal Survey—collect data on the number of schools with libraries and media centers. For example, the Surveys for the Institute of Museum and Library Services collected data from more than 9,000 libraries in 2022.
In a 1975 episode of Mister Rogers Neighborhood, wino casino Hamilton said of the Wicked Witch, “Sometimes, Mister Rogers, I’m a little unhappy because lots of children are quite scared by her.” Another of the films stars was often recognized by children who ran away crying! The movie stars Grand Rapids, MN, native Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale, a Kansas farm girl who is transported to the Land of Oz by a tornado. L. Frank Baum’s popular children’s book The Wizard of Oz became one of the most beloved motion pictures in history thanks to a talented cast of lovable characters.
These improvements reveal that the U.S. population is much more multiracial and diverse than what we measured in the past. An official website of the United States government The first link explains the methodology used for identifying and editing names data. Or it might be the first census showing an African American family from the rural South living in an urban neighborhood in the Northeast or Midwest, or a family from the rural Midwest living in California.

Story Ideas and Statistics

• Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.
• These multiple measures of diversity complement the 2020 Census redistricting data release and enable us to explore the richness and complexity of our nation’s population in a new light.
• Visit the Census Bureau’s Genealogy page to see frequently occurring surnames from previous censuses.
• The remaining racial and ethnic groups combined to make up 11.4% of the total population, representing the diffusion score.
• The White alone non-Hispanic population was the largest — or most prevalent — racial or ethnic group for most counties in the United States.

In 2018, the American Community Survey reported that 285,540 people worked as librarians, curators, and archivists. Library employees not only maintain the books and cataloging systems, but also host story time, meet the author, and literacy events to encourage children to develop a life-long love for reading. American libraries are home to thousands of books written for children. In the years to come, moviegoers can look forward to even more Dr. Seuss-inspired movies, including a film adaptation of Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

During the same period, the largest racial or ethnic group has changed for some states and counties, and local level results illuminate new areas of diversity across the country. Using the same Diversity Index calculation for 2020 and 2010 redistricting data, the chance that two people chosen at random will be from different racial or ethnic groups has increased to 61.1% in 2020 from 54.9% in 2010. In this format, the DI tells us the chance that two people chosen at random will be from different racial and ethnic groups. A value close to 1 indicates that almost everyone in the population has different racial and ethnic characteristics. A value of 0 indicates that everyone in the population has the same racial and ethnic characteristics. We use the Diversity Index (DI) to measure the probability that two people chosen at random will be from different racial and ethnic groups.

The 2021 Annual Survey of Manufactures found that American footwear manufacturing establishments (NAICS 3162) had annual sales, value of shipments, or revenues of more than $1.6 billion and employed 10,379 people nationwide. Today, thousands of people in the United States continue to produce footwear for stage, screen, sports, the office, and outdoor adventures. More recently, Nike’s “Cortez” sneakers played a “supporting role” in 1994’s Academy Award-winning movie Forest Gump. More than 8 decades since the movie’s release, the sparkling red shoes still attract excited crowds to the Smithsonian’s Museum of American History in Washington, DC. The red sequined “ruby slippers” Judy Garland wore in the 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz are perhaps the most famous footwear in American popular culture.
Table 2 shows the 10 counties (with 5,000 or more total population) with the highest DI in 2020 and their scores in 2010. Of the states listed here, Maryland had the largest DI gain, increasing from 60.7% in 2010 to 67.3% in 2020. Table 1 shows the 10 states with the highest DI in the 2020 Census and their 2020 and 2010 census values. More detailed data for the nation, states, counties and Puerto Rico are available in our interactive data visualization. Our recent blog, Measuring Racial and Ethnic Diversity for the 2020 Census, includes detailed information about these specific diversity measures and how to interpret them.

• The other eight (Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore, Cleveland, St Louis, Washington, D.C., and Boston) all saw their decennial populations peak in 1950 and fall in the coming decades.
• The Census Bureau collected data about libraries—like the public library in Universal City, Texas (pictured above)—as reimbursable projects for the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).
• By 1970, as suburbanization boomed, that share had slipped to 61% and Chicago’s population had declined somewhat.
• This is because the vast majority (94%) of responses to the race question that are classified as Some Other Race alone are from people of Hispanic or Latino origin identifying as “Mexican,” “Latino” and other Hispanic origin groups.
• French Canadian and Canadian were the two largest detailed groups in the “Other White” population, with their alone or in any combination populations each exceeding half a million.

The 1950 Census might have been the last census your grandparents filled out before moving from the city to the suburbs. Aurora, Colo., meanwhile, was a small suburb of Denver with just 11,000 people. The rankings of cities by population were considerably different in 1950 prior to the trends in regional migration and suburbanization. Its population would more than quadruple to 439,000 in the next 10 years. Only three of the country’s 10 largest cities in 1950 (Los Angeles, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C.) were in the South or West.
Fearing the film would be unpopular, movie studio executives chose these cities to debut the movie to better gauge audience reaction. On August 11–12, 1939, the movie The Wizard of Oz premiered in Dennis, MA, Kenosha, WI, and Oconomowoc, WI. In 2021, spending at movie theaters and streaming content at home and on mobile devices reached $36.8 billion. When the movie The Wizard of Oz premiered in August 1939, 85 million Americans watched movies in theaters and spent $659 million every week. Education is one of many topics covered by the survey and the data are not designed to provide a highly detailed look at the many different types of educational arrangements and innovations pursued by households in this unusual school year. Among the 15 largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA), for example, the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH MSA, went from 0.9% in the spring of 2020 to 8.9% by the fall.