What's In A Name?

Filmmaker Alan Berliner set out to answer this question...especially about his own name. I don't know if you were able to see his answer about identity, but it was the film, The Sweetest Sound. (It originally aired back in 2001. But, you can still purchase the film.)

On the PBS P.O.V. review of the film, a popularity index is provided along with an interview of the filmmaker. If you'd like to find out how common your surname is in America, check the ranking database of 50,000 most common names.

For fun, I thought I would look up some names.
First, from my family...
Stremmel is surname number 40519 in the USA.
Webb is surname number 122 in the USA.
Washburn is surname number 1512 in the USA.
Reum is surname number 49540 in the USA.
Smith is surname number 1 in the USA.
Keefer is surname number 3808 in the USA.
Mather is surname number 4736 in the USA.
Ernst is surname number 1913 in the USA.

Now, from the in-laws in my family...
Strode is surname number 11189 in the USA.
Krohe, as a surname, does not exist in this database, because it is not among the top 55,000 most common names in the US.
Vanderploeg is surname number 18032 in the USA.
Brown is surname number 5 in the USA.
Geissler is surname number 11769 in the USA.
Prior is surname number 5464 in the USA.
Sparrow is surname number 4718 in the USA.
Gardner is surname number 160 in the USA.
Coutre, as a surname, does not exist in this database, because it is not among the top 55,000 most common names in the US.
McNeil is surname number 832 in the USA.
Kinsel is surname number 12866 in the USA.
Patterson is surname number 94 in the USA.
Wardin, as a surname, does not exist in this database, because it is not among the top 55,000 most common names in the US.