Explore the Family Name Sandman

The meaning of Sandman

1. Americanized form of German Sandmann. 2. Dutch: occupational name for someone who transported or sold sand, from zand ‘sand’ + man ‘man’, or a variant of the cognate habitational name Van de Sand (see Sand 4). In North America, this surname may also be an altered form of the variant Zandman. 3. Swedish: from sand ‘sand’ (see Sand 1) + man ‘man’.

Dictionary of American Family Names, 2nd edition, © Oxford University Press, 2022.

How common is the last name Sandman in the United States?

Based on data from the Decennial U.S. Census, the popularity of the surname "Sandman" saw a slight decrease between 2000 and 2010. The rank of this surname fell by 5.09%, moving from 14,432 in 2000 to 15,166 in 2010. Despite this drop in rank, the actual count of individuals with the surname increased by 2.37% over the period, indicating that while more people are bearing the name, it has not gained significant popularity relative to other surnames.

	2000	2010	Change
Rank	#14,432	#15,166	-5.09%
Count	1,898	1,943	2.37%
Proportion per 100k	0.7	0.66	-5.71%

Race and Ethnicity of people with the last name Sandman

In terms of ethnicity, the Decennial U.S. Census data reveals some shifts over the decade. The majority of those with the Sandman surname identify as White, although this percentage decreased slightly by 1.49% from 2000 to 2010. Interestingly, there were increases observed in those identifying as two or more races (up by 63.79%), Hispanic (up by 27.81%) and American Indian and Alaskan Native (up by 21.30%). While small numbers reported Asian/Pacific Islander ethnicity in 2010, there were no significant changes. It should be noted that for privacy reasons, certain data was suppressed to prevent identification of specific individuals.

	2000	2010	Change
White	93.78%	92.38%	-1.49%
American Indian and Alaskan Native	2.16%	2.62%	21.3%
Hispanic	1.69%	2.16%	27.81%
Two or More Races	1.16%	1.9%	63.79%
Asian/Pacific Islander	0%	0.93%	0%
Black	0%	0%	0%