Shekhtman last name popularity, history, and meaning

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

Meaning of Shekhtman

A surname of Yiddish origin meaning either a ritual slaughterer or cattle dealer.

Shekhtman, 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 Shekhtman surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Shekhtman in America

Shekhtman is the 79075th most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Shekhtman surname appeared 241 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 0 people would have the surname Shekhtman.

We can also compare 2010 data for Shekhtman 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.

20102000Change (%)
Rank79075731547.78%
Count241247-2.46%
Proportion per 100k0.080.09-11.76%

The history of the last name Shekhtman

The surname SHEKHTMAN is of Russian-Jewish origin, originating in the late 18th or early 19th century. It is derived from the Russian word "shekht," meaning "ritual slaughter" in accordance with Jewish dietary laws. This suggests that the name may have been associated with a person who worked as a kosher butcher or shochet.

The earliest known record of the SHEKHTMAN surname dates back to the early 1800s in the Pale of Settlement, a region of the Russian Empire where Jews were allowed to reside. During this period, the Russian authorities required Jews to adopt fixed surnames, often based on their occupations or place of origin.

One of the earliest recorded individuals with the SHEKHTMAN surname was Moshe SHEKHTMAN, born in the town of Vitebsk (now in Belarus) in the late 18th century. He is believed to have worked as a shochet, giving rise to the family name.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many SHEKHTMAN families emigrated from the Russian Empire to escape persecution and seek better opportunities in other parts of the world. Some notable individuals with this surname include:

  1. Aleksandr SHEKHTMAN (1888-1965), a Russian-born American lawyer and labor activist who advocated for worker's rights.
  2. Yakov SHEKHTMAN (1901-1976), a Soviet mathematician known for his contributions to functional analysis.
  3. Naum SHEKHTMAN (1925-2007), a Russian-American physicist and professor at the University of Chicago.
  4. Mikhail SHEKHTMAN (1941-2021), a Russian-American mathematician and professor at Rutgers University.
  5. Vadim SHEKHTMAN (born 1952), a Soviet-born Israeli mathematician and professor at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.

While the SHEKHTMAN name originated in Russia, it has since spread to various parts of the world through immigration and diaspora communities. However, its roots can be traced back to the occupation of ritual slaughter and the Jewish communities of the Russian Empire in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Shekhtman

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

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 Shekhtman was:

Race/EthnicityPercentageTotal Occurrences
Non-Hispanic White Only98.76%238
Non-Hispanic Black Only(S)%(S)
Non-Hispanic Asian and Pacific Islander Only0.00%0
Non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaskan Native0.00%0
Non-Hispanic of Two or More Races0.00%0
Hispanic Origin(S)%(S)

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 Shekhtman has changed in the 10 years between the two census surveys.

20102000Change (%)
White98.76%95.95%2.89%
Black(S)%0.00%(S)%
Asian and Pacific Islander0.00%0.00%0.00%
American Indian and Alaskan Native0.00%0.00%0.00%
Two or More Races0.00%4.05%-200.00%
Hispanic(S)%0.00%(S)%

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

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

Reference this page

We spend a lot of resources downloading, cleaning, merging, and formatting the data that is shown on the site.

If you found the data or information on this page useful in your research, please use the tool below to properly cite or reference Name Census as the source. We appreciate your support!

Search for a name

Search for a first or last name to learn more about its origin, meaning, and more.

Simple as that.

Search
Search
Background shape