Find out how popular the last name Goldfarb is in the United States and learn more about the meaning, history, and race and ethnic origin of people in America who are named Goldfarb.

Goldfarb, like all of the last names we have data for, is identified by the U.S. Census Bureau as a surname which has more than 100 occurrences in the United States in the Decennial Census survey. The most recent statistics we have for the Goldfarb surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Goldfarb in America

Goldfarb is the 9347th most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Goldfarb surname appeared 3,480 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 1 people would have the surname Goldfarb.

We can also compare 2010 data for Goldfarb to data from the previous census in 2000. The table below contains all of the statistics for both years in a side-by-side comparison.

The history of the last name Goldfarb

The surname Goldfarb is of Ashkenazic Jewish origin, derived from the Yiddish words "gold" meaning gold and "farb" meaning color or dye. It likely originated in the late 17th or early 18th century in Eastern Europe, particularly in areas with thriving Jewish communities such as Poland, Ukraine, and Russia.

One of the earliest known records of the Goldfarb name dates back to the late 18th century in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. A merchant named Isaac Goldfarb is mentioned in a census record from the city of Bialystok in 1784. The name may have originated as an occupational surname for a dyer or a merchant who traded in dyed fabrics or textile products.

In the 19th century, the Goldfarb surname began to appear more frequently in various Jewish communities across Eastern Europe. Notable individuals from this period include Rabbi Menachem Mendel Goldfarb (1832-1897), a prominent Hasidic leader and author from the town of Vizhnitz in modern-day Ukraine.

As Jewish migration to Western Europe and the Americas increased in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Goldfarb name spread to new regions. One of the earliest recorded instances of the name in the United States was David Goldfarb (1848-1914), a Russian-born businessman who settled in New York City in the 1880s.

Throughout the 20th century, several individuals with the Goldfarb surname made significant contributions in various fields. These include:

1. Samuel Goldfarb (1891-1978), an American lawyer and civil rights activist who fought against racial discrimination.
2. Sidney Goldfarb (1903-1987), a renowned American psychologist and professor at the University of Chicago.
3. Alexander Goldfarb (born 1949), a Russian-American activist and human rights advocate.
4. Boris Goldfarb (1929-2009), a Russian-American mathematician and computer scientist.
5. David Goldfarb (born 1951), an American mathematician and computer scientist known for his work in optimization algorithms.

While the Goldfarb surname has its roots in Eastern Europe, it has since become widespread among Jewish communities around the world, reflecting the diaspora and migration patterns of the Jewish people over the centuries.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Goldfarb

We also have some data on the ancestry of people with the surname Goldfarb.

The below race categories are the modified race categories used in the Census Bureau's population estimates program. All people were categorized into six mutually exclusive racial and Hispanic origin groups:

1. White only
2. Black only
3. American Indian and Alaskan Native only
4. Asian and Pacific Islander only
5. Hispanic
6. Two or More Races

For the most recent 2010 census data, the race/ethnic origin breakdown for Goldfarb was:

Note: Any fields showing (S) means the data was suppressed for privacy so that the data does not in any way identify any specific individuals.

Since we have data from the previous census in 2000, we can also compare the values to see how the popularity of Goldfarb has changed in the 10 years between the two census surveys.

Data source

The last name data and ethnic breakdown of last names is sourced directly from the Decennial Census survey, conducted every 10 years by the United States Census Bureau.

The history and meaning of the name Goldfarb was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

If you have a correction or suggestion to improve the history of Goldfarb, please contact us.

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