Dawson

At the 2020 census, 80,960 Americans bore the surname Dawson — 386th out of 156,621 surnames on file. That is about one person in 3,692.

By the numbers

People: 80,960
Rank: 386th
How common: 1 in 3,692
Per 100,000: 27.1

Where the name comes from

From Daw, a Middle English pet form.

Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Who bears the name

How people with the surname Dawson described their own race and Hispanic origin at the 2020 census:

White, not Hispanic 65.5%
Black, not Hispanic 25.3%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 4.5%
Hispanic or Latino 3.4%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 0.8%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.5%

Notable people called Dawson

Rosario Dawson (born 1979)American actress
Michael Dawson (born 1983)English association football player
Shane Dawson (born 1988)American Internet personality
Craig Dawson (born 1990)English association football player
Roxann Dawson (born 1958)American actress and director
Richard Dawson (1932–2012)British actor
Charles Dawson (1864–1916)British archaeological forger
Scott Dawson (born 1984)American professional wrestler

People named Dawson with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).

Surnames like Dawson

Also a first name

Dawson has been given to 54,199 American babies as a first name since 1885, peaking in 1999. See it as a given name.

Try it on yourself

Source: US Census Bureau, Frequently Occurring Surnames, 2020. The Census describes the file as the surnames borne by 100 or more people; rarer names are not published. The line is not quite exact, and 617 published names come in under it, the smallest at 92 people. Race and Hispanic origin are self-reported. Rates are worked out against the 298.9 million people the file's own figures are calculated on, which is fewer than the census counted in all: the difference is everyone whose surname was too rare to publish.