Coleson
Of English origin, meaning "coal man" or "coal worker".
Name Census estimates that about 2,457 living Americans carry the first name Coleson. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Coleson today is around 9 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Coleson births was 2024 (253 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Coleson. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Coleson with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Coleson is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 9 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
2.5K
~ 1 in 139,501 Americans
Peak year
2024
253 babies that year
Average age
9
years old
2024 SSA rank
#915
Tracked since 1993
Census
Coleson in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,286 people with the first name Coleson, which placed it at #10,403 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#10,403
National first-name rank
People counted
1.3K
1,286 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
87.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Coleson
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Coleson is White at 87.8%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (6.1%) and Hispanic (3.9%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Coleson described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Coleson at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White87.8% · 1,129
- Two or more races6.1% · 79
- Hispanic or Latino3.9% · 50
- Black or African American1.0% · 13
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.9% · 11
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.3% · 4
Popularity
Coleson: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Coleson from the 1990s through to the 2020s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2020s, with 1,158 total registrations. The name continues to be given at rates close to its all-time high, suggesting it has not yet fallen out of fashion.
Babies born per year
Decades
Coleson by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Coleson during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Colesons live
The SSA's state-level files cover 27 states and territories. Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas recorded the most babies named Coleson, while Maryland, Colorado, Oklahoma recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 51 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Coleson
The name Coleson originates from the Old English language, which was spoken by the Anglo-Saxons in Britain during the early medieval period, from around the 5th to the 11th centuries. It is derived from the Old English words "col" meaning "coal" and "sunu" meaning "son," suggesting that the name may have originally referred to someone who worked with coal or lived near a coal mine.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Coleson can be found in the Domesday Book, a comprehensive survey of landholdings and population in England commissioned by William the Conqueror in 1086. The name is mentioned as a variant spelling of the more common "Colson," which was relatively widespread in parts of Lincolnshire and Yorkshire.
Throughout the Middle Ages, the name Coleson remained relatively obscure, appearing sporadically in various historical documents and parish records. One notable bearer of the name was Coleson de Wylughby, a 14th-century landowner from Nottinghamshire whose name is recorded in the Calendar of Patent Rolls from 1343.
As the centuries progressed, the name Coleson gradually evolved in spelling and pronunciation, with variants such as "Collesone," "Collisoun," and "Collison" appearing in various parts of England. One of the earliest recorded individuals with the modern spelling of "Coleson" was John Coleson, a merchant from Bristol who is mentioned in the city's trade records from the late 16th century.
During the 17th and 18th centuries, several noteworthy individuals bore the name Coleson. Among them was Richard Coleson (1640-1718), a prominent Quaker minister and writer from Westmoreland, whose works on religious topics were widely read during his lifetime. Another notable bearer of the name was William Coleson (1702-1783), a English architect and surveyor who designed several churches and public buildings in London.
In the 19th century, the name Coleson remained relatively uncommon, but a few individuals of note carried it. These include Henry Coleson (1821-1892), a British explorer and naturalist who conducted extensive travels in Africa and wrote several books about his adventures, and James Coleson (1854-1914), an American businessman and philanthropist who founded the Coleson Foundation, which supported educational initiatives in his home state of Pennsylvania.
While never achieving widespread popularity, the name Coleson has persisted throughout history, carried by individuals from various walks of life. Its origins rooted in the Old English language and its association with the coal industry provide a unique glimpse into the cultural and occupational traditions of the Anglo-Saxon world.
People
Coleson + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Coleson as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with C
Other first names starting with C with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Coleson: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Coleson?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,457 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Coleson going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 139,501 US residents.
Is Coleson a common name?
We classify Coleson as "Rare". It ranks above 94.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,477 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Coleson most popular?
The single biggest year for Coleson was 2024, when 253 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Coleson is about 9 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Coleson in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,286 people with the name Coleson, or 0.43 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #10,403 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Coleson in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Coleson?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Coleson appears almost entirely male. Of the 1,293 people counted with this name, 99.5% were male and only a very small share were female. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Coleson?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Coleson is White at 87.8%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (6.1%) and Hispanic (3.9%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Coleson most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Coleson in the 2020 Census, accounting for 87.8% (1,129 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Coleson in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Coleson a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Coleson in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Coleson still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Coleson in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Coleson can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have the name Coleson?
See how many Americans are named Coleson on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.