Explore the Family Name Tussey

The meaning of Tussey

American shortened and altered form of Finnish Tossavainen (via the intermediate form Tossawa): habitational name from Tossava or Tossa in Tavastia, Finland, formed with the surname suffix -nen. The surname Tossavainen is recorded since the 16th century in Savonia in the east of Finland.

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

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

Based on the Decennial U.S. Census data, the surname "Tussey" experienced a slight decline in popularity between the years 2000 and 2010. While its rank slipped from 16,995 to 17,359, marking a decrease of 2.14%, the actual count of people with the surname increased by 5.58% to reach 1,627 individuals in 2010. Despite this increase, the proportion per 100,000 population slightly decreased by 3.51% to 0.55.

	2000	2010	Change
Rank	#16,995	#17,359	-2.14%
Count	1,541	1,627	5.58%
Proportion per 100k	0.57	0.55	-3.51%

Race and Ethnicity of people with the last name Tussey

In terms of ethnic identity, the Tussey surname witnessed some notable shifts between 2000 and 2010 as per the Decennial U.S. Census data. The number of those identifying as White saw a marginal decrease of 1.79% to 95.27%. However, the Hispanic ethnicity showed an increase of 84.55% to reach 2.03% in 2010. Also, there was a significant surge in those reporting as two or more races, which rose by 116.9% to account for 1.54%. Meanwhile, the percentage of those identifying as Black reduced by 52.31% to 0.31%. Interestingly, the Asian/Pacific Islander and American Indian and Alaskan Native groups also started to appear in the 2010 records, accounting for 0.49% and 0.37% respectively.

	2000	2010	Change
White	97.01%	95.27%	-1.79%
Hispanic	1.1%	2.03%	84.55%
Two or More Races	0.71%	1.54%	116.9%
Asian/Pacific Islander	0%	0.49%	0%
American Indian and Alaskan Native	0%	0.37%	0%
Black	0.65%	0.31%	-52.31%