National Geographic has an interesting web-based tool to see a map of the US filled out by surnames – it’s like a big sculpted surname-tag-cloud!
A new view of the United States based on the distribution of common last names shows centuries of history and echoes some of America’s great immigration sagas.
To compile this data, geographers at University College London used phone directories to find the predominant surnames in each state. Software then identified the probable provenances of the 181 names that emerged.
Ben Miller says
That’s really interesting. I see my last name right on top of where my house is, but that is not a surprise to me. Unlike some people, it is pretty difficult to find me just by googling my name.