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

Gustafson, 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 Gustafson surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Gustafson in America

Gustafson is the 1333rd most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Gustafson surname appeared 26,421 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 9 people would have the surname Gustafson.

We can also compare 2010 data for Gustafson 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 Gustafson

The surname Gustafson is of Swedish origin, originating in the 17th century. It is a patronymic name, derived from the personal name Gustaf, the Swedish form of the name Gustavus, combined with the suffix 'son' meaning 'son of'. The name Gustaf itself is derived from the Old Norse name 'Guðlafr', composed of the elements 'guð' meaning 'god' and 'lafr' meaning 'descendant' or 'heir'.

The earliest recorded instances of the surname Gustafson can be found in Swedish church records from the late 17th century. These records often mentioned individuals from rural areas near cities like Stockholm and Gothenburg. The name was particularly prevalent in the provinces of Dalarna and Värmland.

One of the earliest known bearers of the surname was Johan Gustafson, born in 1695 in the village of Mora, Dalarna. He was a farmer and landowner, and his descendants continued to use the surname in the region for generations.

In the 19th century, the name Gustafson began to spread more widely across Sweden as industrialization and urbanization led to increased migration. Some notable individuals from this period include Erik Gustafson (1825-1890), a successful businessman and politician from Gothenburg, and Anna Gustafson (1860-1942), a pioneering educator and women's rights activist from Stockholm.

As Swedish immigration to North America increased in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the surname Gustafson became more common in countries like the United States and Canada. One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name in the United States was Carl Gustafson, born in 1844 in Småland, Sweden, who settled in Minnesota in the 1870s and worked as a farmer.

Other notable individuals with the surname Gustafson include Axel Gustafson (1897-1980), a Swedish-American inventor and entrepreneur who developed the first successful self-winding wristwatch, and Ingemar Gustafson (1919-2008), a Swedish-American academic and historian who served as the president of Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota.

While the surname Gustafson is most closely associated with its Swedish origins, it has since spread to various parts of the world through migration and has been adopted by individuals of different backgrounds and nationalities.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Gustafson

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

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 Gustafson 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 Gustafson 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 Gustafson was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

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

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