Technical Working Paper No. 13

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

TECHNICAL WORKING PAPER NO. 13

March 1996

Building a Spanish 

Surname List for 

the 1990’s— A New 

Approach to an 

Old Problem

by

David L. Word and R. Colby Perkins Jr.

Population Division

U. S. Bureau of the Census

Washington D.C.

The data and results appearing in this working paper were originally introduced at the Annual

Meeting of the Population Association of America (PAA) Miami, Florida May 1994.

The views expressed in this paper are solely attributable to the two authors and do not

necessarily reflect the position of the United States Bureau of the Census.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 i

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

ABSTRACT

The United States Census Bureau produced and released Spanish surname products for 1950, 1960,

1970 and 1980. This 1990 version is another way station in an ongoing research journey. This paper, “Building a Spanish Surname List for the 1990’s—A New Approach to an Old Problem,” differs

from its predecessors in two significant respects.

(1) Until 1990, name has never been part of a permanent Census electronic record. Following the

1990 Census, the Census Bureau appended name to 7 million Census records for the purposes

of determining undercount. The “List” is constructed by tabulating the responses (surname by

surname) to the Spanish origin question for persons in that sample. Well over 90 percent of

male householders with the surnames: GARCIA, MARTINEZ, RODRIGUEZ, and LOPEZ

responded affirmatively to the Spanish origin question while less than 1.0 percent of male

householders named SMITH, JOHNSON, and BROWN provided a positive response to the

Spanish origin question.

(2) In the past, a name was either on the list (e.g., Garcia) and was taken to be Spanish or it did not

appear on the list. The assumption was that any name not on the list was not Spanish. Since

neither BROWN nor SILVA appeared on the 1980 Spanish Surname list, one would naturally

assume that neither name was Spanish. In the electronic version of the 1990 “List” we append

auxiliary data for 25,000 surnames including both SILVA and BROWN that allow users to form

their own lists. Almost 60 percent of the SILVA’s in our 1990 Census sample responded that

they were Hispanic while less than 1 percent of BROWN’s claimed to be Hispanic. Moreover,

another auxiliary item suggests that the letters S I L V A form a potentially Spanish word. That

same statement cannot be made for B R O W N. From this data, some users might include

SILVA on their own personal Spanish surname list, while others would justifiably arrive at an

opposite conclusion.

We must emphasize that this product does not violate the confidentiality of Census responses. On

average, each captured surname represents about 40 householders. Moreover, we provide no subnational geographic data nor is there any indication of first name or age of respondent. Given these

conditions, we are confident that this file does not provide information that could identify any individual enumerated in the 1990 Census.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 ii

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This paper could not have been written without the help of our colleagues at the Census Bureau. 

Six of our co-workers provided so much assistance that they are singled out for special thanks.

1. Randy Klear single-handedly built the data base used in the surname extraction operation. He

wrote the programs to normalize names (JOHN SMITH JR is normalized to JOHN SMITH) as

well as creating the algorithms for inverting names (JOHNSON CYNTHIA is inverted to CYNTHIA JOHNSON) when appropriate.

2. Sam Davis designed the programs to delineate infrequently occurring surnames into various

Hispanic categories.

3. Marie Pees created the electronic diskettes that are an important supplement to the paper. For

persons needing specific information on individual surnames, the statistical material located on

the diskette is crucial.

4. Signe Wetrogan gave the authors a great deal of her time, enthusiasm and expertise in their early efforts at organizing and writing this paper. Many of her suggestions on points of emphasis

have been included in this document.

5. Gregg Robinson painstakingly read and re-read several versions of this paper. His sense for

where to expand and where to modify the authors’ original phrasing were almost always right

on the money.

6. Finally, we want to commend Rheta Pemberton on her word processing skills and her patience

in producing “just one more final draft”. The typographical errors which have crept into this

paper are the sole responsibility of the authors.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 iii

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction Page 1

2.0 Background Page 2

3.0 Purpose of Constructing a Spanish Surname List Page 3

4.0 One Dozen Common Spanish Surnames Page 4

5.1 Statistical Properties for Frequently Occurring Surnames Page 6

5.2 Statistical Properties for Infrequently Occurring Surnames Page 8

6.0 Limitations Page 9

7.0 Rarely Occurring Surnames: Or When Do Statistics End and 

When Does Common Sense Take Over? Page 10

8.0 Conclusion Page 13

9.0 References Page 14

10.0 Appendix Page 15

TEXT TABLES

Table 1 Tabular Entries in an Ideal Situation Page 2

Table 2 Tabular Entries in a Normal Situation Page 2

Table 3 Ranking Spanish Surnames by Householder Page 4

Table 4 Percent of Householders and Persons Self-Identified as Hispanic Page 5

Table 5 Criteria for Spanish Surname Classification Page 6

Table 6A Categorizing Frequently Occurring Spanish Surnames 

(1980 List) by Proportion Hispanic Page 6

Table 6B Categorizing Frequently Occurring Non-Spanish Surnames

(1980 List) by Proportion Hispanic Page 7

Table 7 Hispanic Classification for Surnames Occurring 25 

or More Times on the SOR File Page 7

Table 8 Classifying Surnames on the 1980 Spanish Surname List According 

to Number of Observations on the SOR File Page 8

Table 9 1990 Hispanic Classification of Surnames Occurring 5 to 24 Times in

the SOR File Based on Hispanic Classification in 1980 Page 9

Table 10 Standard Errors in Proportion Hispanic Arising From a Sample Page 10

Table 11 Probability of Finding “X” Hispanics from 5 Independent Observations Page 11

Table 12 Surnames Included on the 1980 Spanish Surname List Which

Appear 4 or Fewer Times on the SOR File Page 11

Table 13 Surnames That Are Not Included on the 1980 Spanish Surname List 

and Appear 4 or Fewer Times on the SOR File Page 12

APPENDIX TABLES

Table A 639 Most Frequently Occurring Heavily Hispanic Surnames Page 20

Table B Spanish Surname Categories Page 22

Table C Selected Summary Statistics for Spanish Surnames Page 24
Technical Working Paper No. 13 1

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Building a Spanish Surname List for the 1990’s—

A New Approach to An Old Problem

by

David L. Word and R. Colby Perkins Jr.

This paper describes a direct and reproducible method for creating an inventory of surnames characteristic of the Hispanic origin population in the United States. The individual surnames included in

this inventory are created by combining distinct surnames into groups and then analyzing group responses to the 1990 Hispanic origin question. Persons wishing to purchase an electronic file need to

be specific as to whether they want the long list (Section 10.1.2) or the short list (Section 10.1.3).

Both electronic versions are available through the Population Division’s Statistical Information Office (301-457-2422). If you would like or need additional insight into the contents of this paper,

David Word (301-457-2103) dword@census.gov and Colby Perkins (301-457-2428) rperkins@census.gov will welcome your comments.

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In 1980 the Census Bureau published a list of 12,497 different “Spanish” surnames. The central

premise for including a surname on that list was the “similarity” of that name’s geographic distribution to the geographic distribution of the Hispanic origin population within the United States. The

12,497 surnames appearing on the 1980 Spanish surname list were culled from a data base of 85

million taxpayers filing individual federal tax returns for 1977.

Each of the 1.4 million distinct names appearing on the 1977 IRS file was subjected to a complex

mathematical function incorporating Bayes’ theorem to determine the “odds” that any particular surname was Spanish (Word, et al 1978). When the arithmetic value of the function exceeded a predetermined standard, that surname became a potential candidate for inclusion on the 1980 Spanish surname list. If the numerical value of the multinomial function failed to reach that criterion, the surname being tested was immediately discarded. This procedure works remarkably well for commonly occurring surnames, but a great amount of “hands on” effort was required to dispose of infrequently occurring surnames that surfaced as “Spanish” on the initial selection pass.

In this paper, Perkins and Word discard that indirect Bayesian approach in favor of a direct method

to reach the same ends. Here, instead of attempting to “classify” surnames through geographic distribution, we actually link ethnicity and name. The ideal data source for classifying surnames by

proportion Hispanic origin would be the 1990 Census in its entirety. Because of disclosure concerns,

name has never been part of the computerized permanent record even though the Decennial Census

routinely requests name for followup purposes.

Nevertheless, a very large sample data set is available that does link name (first and last) to individual 1990 Census records. This individual record file, hereafter called the SOR—(Spanish Origin)—file contains 7,154,390 person records1 and was originally created for the purpose of estimating undercount in the 1990 Census. Since slightly over 1.5 million of those records lack name and/

or Hispanic origin information, we limited ourselves to the 5,609,592 records that include both a

valid surname and a response to the Hispanic origin question.

1Following the 1990 Census, the Census Bureau instituted a large scale post-enumerative survey (PES) to measure

undercount in the 1990 census (Hogan, 1993; 1992). The formal PES sample was limited to 377,000 persons residing in

171,000 households in 5300 preselected blocks. The much larger SOR sample includes those PES blocks AND surrounding ring blocks. The SOR sample file used in this analysis is nearly 20 times as large as the formal PES sample.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Most people within a household have the same surname and the same ethnicity, implying that

5,609,592 person records do not produce 5,609,592 independent observations. To mitigate the effect

of clustering, we limit our universe to the 1,868,781 Householder2 records that include valid responses to both surname and Hispanic origin. This “householder” data set contains 268,783 distinct

surnames—167,765 occurring exactly one time. In fairness, a large portion of surnames occurring

one time appear to be errors in keying or errors in interpreting handwriting. GOUZALEZ, GOMEZS, and RODRIGUF are the surnames of three householders appearing in the SOR file who designated themselves as Hispanic.

For reasons sited in footnote 2, all future discussions of frequency/appearances/observations

for individual surnames in the SOR file, will be taken as householders not persons.

2.0 BACKGROUND

If it were possible to develop a Spanish surname list that identifies all Hispanics, and does not include any non-Hispanics, we could represent that condition by Table 1.

TABLE 1—TABULAR ENTRIES IN AN IDEAL SITUATION

Hispanic

Origin

Non-Hispanic

Origin

All Origins

Spanish Surname X ZERO X

Non-Spanish Surname ZERO Y Y

All Names X Y Z

In Table 1, each of the X persons denoting themselves as Hispanic possesses a Spanish surname, and

no person of Hispanic origin has a non- Spanish surname. Moreover, not one single person among

the Y non-Hispanics possess a Spanish surname. This pattern does not hold in the real world. Hispanic persons may possess surnames that are not “Spanish”, and non-Hispanics,—especially married

women—can have Spanish Surnames. Table 2 illustrates this “real world” situation.

TABLE 2—TABULAR ENTRIES IN A NORMAL SITUATION

Hispanic

Origin

Non-Hispanic

Origin

All Origins

Spanish Surname X p S

Non-Spanish Surname q Y T

All Names H U Z

If the surname list under consideration behaves normally, the entries “p” and “q” are small relative

to the values of X and Y. Displaying the data in this form clarifies the two relationships which are

crucial in evaluating any Spanish surname list.

2The term “householder” used in the context of this paper is limited to male or never married female householders plus

any other male or never married female in the household not related to the householder. We expressly exclude ever married women from the calculations because our interest in the relationship of surname to ethnicity lies in the potential of a

given surname to identify persons of Hispanic origin. As would be suspected, the existing 1980 Spanish surname list is

less effective in identifying the ethnicity of ever married females than any other demographic group (Perkins, 1993).
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

1. The entry “p” represents the number of persons possessing any “Spanish surname” appearing on

an existing Spanish surname list who do not identify themselves as Hispanic. We define Error

of Commission to be the ratio of p to S. That is, of the S persons who have Spanish surnames,

“p” are not Hispanic. As a rule of thumb, fewer than 10 percent of the persons with generally

accepted “Spanish” surnames fail to identify themselves as Hispanic. Ambiguous surnames,

such as SANTOS and SILVA, should be excluded from any Spanish Surname list if a user’s

goal is to minimize Error of Commission.

2. The entry “q” represents persons who identify themselves as Hispanic, but whose surname is

not found on a given Spanish surname list. Error of Omission is analogous to Error of Commission and is the ratio of q to H. However, Error of Omission is not strictly a rate. It is the

proportion of the Hispanic origin population whose last name does not appear on a particular

Spanish surname list. Although fewer than 1 percent of persons with non-Spanish surnames

identify themselves as Hispanic, non-Hispanics outnumber Hispanics by 10 to 1 in the United

States. For that reason, it is virtually impossible for Error of Omission to dip much below 10

percent, regardless of “fringe” surnames that are added to an existing surname list. If one desires to lower the Error of Omission at the expense of Error of Commission, indefinite surnames

such as SANTOS and SILVA need to be included on a Spanish surname list.

3.0 PURPOSE OF CONSTRUCTING A SPANISH SURNAME LIST

The existing 1980 Spanish surname list was originally created to code persons of Spanish surname in

the five Southwestern States at the time of the 1980 Census (Passel and Word, 1980). But that surname list has had a far wider range of uses and users since its release. Five practical applications

involving the use of Spanish surnames follow:

3.1 Mortality Studies. Until very recently (late 1960’s) there was no attempt to identify the Latin

American community with a single unifying term. As a result, Mexicans, Germans, Iraqis and

Peruvians were terms for persons of four distinct ethnic groups. By the late 1970’s, the term

Spanish origin came into vogue and Mexicans, Peruvians, Puerto Ricans, etc. were combined

under a single generic designation—Spanish origin population. (The term Spanish origin has

gradually been replaced or used interchangeably with the term Hispanic origin.) At the same

time (1980) the Social Security Administration (SSA) revised their application form to request

ethnic (”Hispanic”) information for Social Security applicants. But neither Social Security nor

its sister agency, Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA/Medicare), felt that it was necessary to obtain direct information on Hispanic origin for persons who had applied for and received Social Security numbers prior to 1980.

In order to obtain information on mortality of the elderly Hispanic population, HCFA is contemplating a large scale mortality study of the Hispanic origin population enrolled in Medicare. For

a large proportion of that population, “Hispanic origin” will be defined and assigned on the basis of surnames contained on either the existing 1980 or the new 1990 Spanish surname list.

3.2 Population Estimates. The Census Bureau’s initial effort at producing local area population

estimates for the Hispanic population (Word, 1989) relied on the premise that the domestic

migration rate of the Hispanic origin population could be approximated from the migration of

the Spanish surnamed population as defined in 1980.

3.3 Customer Base. A utility company knows its customer base (by surname) at time t0 and time

t1. The ratio of Spanish surnamed customers at the end point relative to the starting point provides an excellent basis for estimating change in the Hispanic origin population from the beginning to the end of the time period.

3.4 Marketing. In the first three applications, it was more important to limit errors of commission

than errors of omission. But for marketing purposes it is generally useful to approach persons

who are tangential to the group being studied. Suppose that a publisher wishes to launch a mag-
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

azine written in Spanish about items of interest to persons of Hispanic origin. In order to get the

largest subscriber base, it would be worthwhile to contact persons with borderline Spanish surnames on the chance that they are Hispanic.

3.5 Census Use. The Census Bureau is continually faced with the problem of “estimating” data

when the respondent does not supply data on a census form. This estimation process is called

“editing” or “imputation”. Given that name will be captured on the year 2000 census record, a

possible option to be considered is to use name to improve editing the Hispanic origin question

when a direct response is not available.

4.0 ONE DOZEN COMMON SPANISH SURNAMES

The paper contains many abridged tables illustrating the authors’ logic in generating Spanish surnames. For frequently occurring surnames, the qualification standards are self evident—we need

only to know the ratio of successes (persons with a particular name identifying as Hispanic) to failures (persons with that same surname identifying as non-Hispanic). For rarely occurring names, the

procedures for deciding whether a surname is or is not Spanish require more innovation.

As a starting point, we tabulated for each surname (SMITH as well as GARCIA) the proportion of

persons who indicate that they are Hispanic. Using this construct, the criteria for establishing numerical limits on what constitutes a Spanish surname can be left to the individual data user. In practice, 95 percent of male householders with frequently occurring surnames (e.g., GOMEZ, GONZALEZ, GARCIA, RUIZ, etc.,) said they were Hispanic while less than 1 percent of males with common Anglo-Saxon surnames report themselves to be Hispanic. There are a few surnames (e.g., SILVA and SANTOS) for which the proportion of Hispanics is close to one-half, but these difficult to

classify surnames are quite rare.

Approximately 20 percent of the Spanish surnamed population in the United States is concentrated

in an even dozen names. The relative positioning of those 12 Spanish surnames in 1977 and 1990

appear in Table 3.

TABLE 3—RANKING SPANISH SURNAMES BY HOUSEHOLDER

(Source: 1977 (IRS); 1990 (Census SOR file))

1977 1990

Rank Name Percent Rank Name Percent

1. Garcia 2.97 1. Garcia 2.90

2. Martinez 2.69 2. Martinez 2.73

3. Rodriguez 2.51 3. Rodriguez 2.55

4. Lopez 1.99 4. Lopez 2.23

5. Hernandez 1.89 5. Hernandez 2.16

6. Gonzalez 1.65 6. Gonzalez 1.87

7. Perez 1.57 7. Perez 1.73

8. Sanchez 1.41 8. Sanchez 1.50

9. Gonzales 1.18 9. Rivera 1.24

10. Ramirez 1.13 10. Ramirez 1.20

11. Torres 1.03 11. Torres 1.15

12. Rivera 0.98 12. Gonzales 1.06

TOTAL 21.00 TOTAL 22.31
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

The term “householder” in Table 3 is used for convenience and does not follow a precise census

definition. For the 1977 entries, a more exact descriptor would be “primary taxpayers on 1977 IRS

returns”. The 1990 SOR source includes male householders but excludes all female householders

currently or previously married.

Table 3 focuses upon the stability of surname positional rankings. Even though the Hispanic origin

population in the United States increased by 70 percent over the 13 year period (1977 to 1990), the

relative positioning of the 12 most frequently occurring Spanish surnames are invariant in both data

sources. Were it not for the inversion of RIVERA and GONZALES, the individual positional rankings among the first 12 Spanish surnames would be identical.

We are now prepared to address the following question: “Just how effective are Spanish surnames in

identifying the Hispanic origin population?” Table 4 attempts to answer that question by presenting

surname data from the SOR research file for both “householders” (H.H.) and all persons (POP).

Note how the inclusion of ever married females in the POP column depresses the effectiveness of

both Spanish and non-Spanish surnames as classifiers of ethnic populations.

TABLE 4—PERCENT OF HOUSEHOLDERS AND PERSONS

SELF-IDENTIFIED AS HISPANIC 

(Source 1990 Census-SOR)

Spanish Surnames Non-Spanish Surnames

Rank Surname H. H. Pop. Rank Surname H. H. Pop.

1. Garcia 94.5 91.0 1. Smith 0.7 1.2

2. Martinez 95.9 93.2 2. Johnson 0.6 1.1

3. Rodriguez 96.9 94.2 3. Williams 0.8 1.1

4. Lopez 94.6 91.8 4. Brown 0.9 1.3

 5. Hernandez 97.0 94.2 5. Jones 0.5 0.9

6. Gonzalez 98.0 95.5 6. Davis 0.7 1.1

 7. Perez 95.8 92.6 7. Miller 0.6 1.3

8. Sanchez 96.4 93.4 8. Wilson 1.0 1.5

9. Rivera 96.1 92.3 9. Anderson 0.7 1.4

10. Ramirez 96.7 94.3 10. Moore 0.5 1.1

11. Torres 95.3 92.9 11. Taylor 0.7 1.1

12. Gonzales 92.1 89.8 12. Thomas 0.8 1.2

—————————————————————————————————————

30. Silva 57.3 60.0 13. Martin 2.5 3.2

47. Santos 60.3 61.5 209. Oliver 3.1 3.0

Table 4 demonstrates just how effectively the top 12 Spanish and Anglo surnames classify the total

population as to Hispanic or non-Hispanic origin. About 93 percent of the population and 96 percent of the householders with the 12 most common Spanish surnames identified themselves as Hispanic in the 1990 Census. On the other hand, only 1.2 percent of the population and 0.7 percent of

the householders with the 12 most frequently occurring Anglo names answered the Hispanic origin

question affirmatively.

Note that MARTIN and OLIVER are substantially more Hispanic than the other 12 Anglo surnames.

The reason for this is that the pronunciation of MARTIN and OLIVER can be altered from English

to Spanish by accenting the last syllable rather than the next to the last syllable. We do not doubt

that persons pronouncing their surnames as MAR TEEN or O LEE VAIR are generally Hispanic.

Given that a name’s pronunciation cannot be guessed from its spelling, the surnames MARTIN and

OLIVER should not be classified as Spanish in the United States. Only 3 percent of persons with

names spelled M-A-R-T-I-N or O-L-I-V-E-R responded positively to the Hispanic origin question on

the 1990 Census.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

5.1 STATISTICAL PROPERTIES FOR FREQUENTLY 

OCCURRING SURNAMES

The primary goal of this research is to supply statistical data on surnames where a sizeable proportion of persons with these surnames self-identify as Hispanic. Approximately 95 percent of householders possessing the 12 most frequently occurring Spanish surnames (Table 4) identify as Hispanic, and that pattern holds for the majority of Spanish surnames on the existing 1980 list. To avoid

the awkward construction “x percent of persons with surname s are Hispanic”, we will employ the

arbitrary, but easily understandable usage of “Heavily Hispanic”, “Generally Hispanic”, “Moderately

Hispanic”, “Occasionally Hispanic” and “Rarely Hispanic” for surname classification purposes.

Table 5 defines these terms.

TABLE 5—CRITERIA FOR SPANISH SURNAME CLASSIFICATION

Spanish Surname Proportion of Householders

Classification Who are Hispanic

1. Heavily Hispanic Over 75 Percent

2. Generally Hispanic 50 Percent < x  75 Percent

3. Moderately Hispanic 25 Percent < x  50 Percent

4. Occasionally Hispanic 5 Percent < x  25 Percent

5. Rarely Hispanic Less than or equal to 5 percent

6. Indeterminant Name not on file

Within the SOR file, there were 8,614 distinct “householder” surnames which appear 25 or more

times. Based on an extrapolation of Social Security data (Social Security Administration, 1984),

persons with those 8,614 surnames account for 70 percent of the American population. 715 of these

8,614 surnames matched entries appearing on the 1980 Spanish surname list. Unpublished data

from Passel and Word’s earlier work suggest that these 715 “Spanish” surnames represent 83 percent

of the Spanish surname population.

Tables 6A, 6B, and 7 provide “householder” data on proportion Hispanic for those 8,614 surnames.

TABLE 6A—CATEGORIZING FREQUENTLY OCCURRING SPANISH

SURNAMES (1980 LIST) BY PROPORTION HISPANIC

Total Surnames = 715

Heavily Hispanic (over 75 percent) 93.1

More than 95 percent 43.4

More than 90 percent 73.1

Generally Hispanic (50 to 75 percent) 6.0

Moderately Hispanic (25 to 50 percent) 0.7

Occasionally Hispanic (5 to 25 percent) 0.1

Rarely Hispanic (less than 5 percent) 0.0

From the information appearing in Table 6A and Table 7, it is evident that the Bayesian approach

used to create the 1980 Spanish Surname List was quite successful. The vast majority (93.1 percent)

of these 715 names fell into the Heavily Hispanic category, and nearly three-fourths of those surnames (73.1 percent) were Hispanic 90 percent of the time.

In our 1990 SOR File, we found only 5 instances where a “frequently” occurring 1980 “Spanish”

surname fell into the Moderate classification (FELIX, PASCUAL, MIGUEL, JUAN, and TOLENTINO). And there is only a single instance (DECASTRO) where a surname appearing on the 1980
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Spanish list would be classified as Occasionally Hispanic based on data in the SOR file. No surname appearing on the 1980 Spanish surname list occurring 25 or more times falls into the Rarely

Hispanic category.

We now turn to the 7,899 surnames occurring at least 25 times in the SOR file that do not appear on

the 1980 Spanish surname list.

TABLE 6B—CATEGORIZING FREQUENTLY OCCURRING

NON-SPANISH SURNAMES (1980 LIST) BY PROPORTION HISPANIC

(Total Surnames = 7,899)

Rarely Hispanic (less than 5 percent) 96.3

Less than 2 percent 84.3

Occasionally Hispanic (5 to 25 percent) 3.0

Moderately Hispanic (25 to 50 percent) 0.5

Generally Hispanic (50 to 75 percent) 0.3

Heavily Hispanic (over 75 percent) 0.0

Based on results from the SOR sample, not one of the 7,899 most frequently occurring “non-Spanish

surnames” would now be assigned to the Heavily Hispanic category. There are, however, 20 surnames categorized as Generally Hispanic based on the SOR sample. They are, in order of Hispanic

occurrence: (1) SILVA, (2) ROMAN, (3) MACHADO, (4) VENTURA, (5) PIMENTEL, (6) PALMA, (7) AQUINO, (8) BELLO, (9) ARAUJO, (10) CHAVES, (11) LEMOS, (12) VALERIO, (13)

MANZO, (14) MATTA, (15) SALVADOR, (16) MACEDO, (17) VICTORIA, (18) BARBOZA,

(19) REAL, and (20) LOMAS

Table 7 provides a numerical assessment of the Hispanic classification for the 8,614 surnames which

appear 25 or more times in the SOR file. When Passel and Word created their 1980 Spanish surname list, they did not have the luxury of using the General or Moderate classification where most of

the inconsistencies lie. As might be expected many of the surnames falling into those two categories

were considered “close calls” by Word and Passel when they developed the 1980 Spanish surname

list.

TABLE 7—HISPANIC CLASSIFICATION FOR SURNAMES 

OCCURRING 25 OR MORE TIMES ON THE SOR FILE

(On List: surname classified as Spanish in 1980)

On List Not on List

Heavily Hispanic (75% and over) 666 0

Generally Hispanic (50-75%) 43 20

Moderately Hispanic (25-50%) 5 42

Occasionally Hispanic (5-25%) 1 234

Rarely Hispanic (less than 5%) 0 7603

TOTAL 715 7899
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Summary: The most frequent 8,614 surnames (715 + 7899) in the SOR file are exceedingly efficient for differentiating the Hispanic and Non-Hispanic populations. All of the 666 names which are

over 75 percent Hispanic in the SOR file were identified as Spanish surnames in 1980. There are

7,603 surnames, none previously categorized as “Spanish”, where fewer than 5 percent of respondents indicated that they are Hispanic. Note the paucity of surnames falling into the General and

Moderate categories.

5.2 STATISTICAL PROPERTIES FOR INFREQUENTLY 

OCCURRING SURNAMES

Even though the 8,614 most frequently occurring surnames in the SOR file contain 70 percent of the

total population and 83 percent of the Spanish surname population, they represent a very small proportion of all surnames or all surnames designated as “Spanish”. The information appearing in Table

8 demonstrates that the correspondence between surnames classified as Spanish in 1980 and 1990

becomes somewhat weaker as the SOR sample thins. Nevertheless, the correspondence between

surname and ethnicity for surnames occurring as few as 5 to 9 times in the SOR “householder” sample is still strong.

TABLE 8—CLASSIFYING SURNAMES ON THE 1980 SPANISH

SURNAME LIST ACCORDING TO NUMBER OF OBSERVATIONS ON

THE SOR FILE (householder only)

Group I, 25 or More Observations n = 715

Group II, 10 to 24 Observation n = 605

Group III, 5 to 9 Observations n = 776

Group I Group II Group III

n = 715 n = 605 n = 776

Heavily Hispanic 93.1 84.3 78.4

Generally Hispanic 6.0 10.4 11.1

Moderately Hispanic 0.7 3.3 6.1

Occasionally Hispanic 0.1 1.6 2.6

Rarely Hispanic 0.0 0.3 1.9

Again referring to Passel and Word’s unpublished data, the most frequent 1320 (those occurring 10

or more times) Spanish surnames on their 1980 list cover 90.6 percent of the Spanish surnamed population. When we extend the universe to the most frequent 2096 Spanish surnames (those occurring

5 or more times in the SOR sample), we reach 93.6 percent of the 1980 Spanish surnamed population.

Table 9, following, is similar to Table 7 but is confined to surnames appearing 5 to 24 times in the

SOR file.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

TABLE 9—1990 HISPANIC CLASSIFICATION OF SURNAMES

OCCURRING 5 TO 24 TIMES IN THE SOR FILE BASED ON HISPANIC

CLASSIFICATION IN 1980

 10 to 24 5 to 9

Observations Observations

1990 Hispanic On 1980 Not On On 1980 Not On

Classification List 1980 List List 1980 List

Heavily Hispanic 510 9 600 58

Generally Hispanic 63 22 94 53

Moderately Hispanic 20 79 50 151

Occasionally Hispanic 10 893 17 1005

Rarely Hispanic 2 9033 15 15345

TOTAL 605 10036 776 16612

As before, the terms “On” and “Not On” refer to whether the surname does or does not appear on

the 1980 Spanish surname list. There are 1381 (605+776) different surnames on the 1980 Spanish

surname list which appear 5 to 24 times in the SOR sample file. Only 44 (10 + 2 + 17 + 15) of

those surnames will be reclassified as either Occasionally or Rarely Hispanic based on the 1990

analysis.

Again referring to Table 9, we find that there are 26,648 (10,036 + 16,612) different surnames occurring 5 to 24 times on the SOR file that do not appear on the 1980 Spanish surname list. Only 67

(9+58) of those names are now classified as Heavily Hispanic. An additional 75 names (22+53) fall

into the Generally Hispanic category.

Summary: Of the 605 Spanish names on the 1980 list occurring 10 to 24 times, 95 percent fall into

the Heavy or General classifications, and only 2 names fall into the Rarely Hispanic group. For 776

names that occurred 5 to 9 times, almost 90 percent continue to be classified as Heavily or Generally

Spanish. Fifteen surnames previously classified as Hispanic are now Rarely Hispanic.

6.0 LIMITATIONS

The data presented in Tables 3 through 9 are derived from a sample—albeit a very large one. The

5,609,592 matchable SOR records contain 597,533 individuals who reported themselves to be Hispanic in the 1990 Census. The proportion Hispanic (10.7 percent) within the SOR sample is higher

than the Hispanic proportion (9.0 percent) enumerated in the 1990 Census. This finding is not unexpected as there was a conscious effort to oversample Hispanics in the PES. If we were using unweighted responses to estimate the total proportion of population with Spanish surnames, we would

certainly overstate that ratio. But this analysis does not attempt to estimate population totals; rather,

our goal is to estimate (on a name by name basis) the proportion of persons who are Hispanic. With

this goal in mind there is no inherent reason against using unweighted observations.

Another limitation is response variance. We must accept the individuals census designation as to his

or her origin. For most census question such as sex and age, a respondent will provide answers that

are consistent over time. Based on the 1990 Decennial Census Content Reinterview Survey

(McKenney et al, 1993), about 7 percent of persons saying that they were Hispanic origin in the

1990 Census decided that they were non-Spanish at the later date. And 11 percent of persons saying

that they were Hispanic origin in the reinterview, indicated that they were non-Spanish on their 1990

Census forms. This recent finding on lack of consistency for Hispanic origin response reinforce previous findings from reinterview surveys.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Finally, we have errors in measurement due to random sampling. When 90 persons out of 100 with

a particular name in the SOR sample answer the Spanish origin question affirmatively, we say that

90 percent of persons with that surname are Hispanic. But, there is an error associated with that estimate. Using the normal approximation to the binomial, the standard error of that estimate is approximatelyp * (1  p)(n . Here p = 0.9 and n = 100. Table 10 below displays values of sampling

errors associated with two choices of “p” and three values of “n”.

TABLE 10—STANDARD ERRORS IN PROPORTION HISPANIC 

ARISING FROM A SAMPLE

N X P Sp

300 270 90.0 1.7

100 90 90.0 3.0

30 27 90.0 5.5*

300 210 70.0 2.6

100 70 70.0 4.6

30 21 70.0 8.4

In Table 10, N = observations;

X = Hispanics;

P = Proportion Hispanic (x/n)

Sp = Standard error of p in percent

* When x or (n-x) drops below 5, the values of the normal distribution are no longer appropriate.

For this row, the two sigma upper and lower limits are 97.5 and 73.7 percent.

7.0 RARELY OCCURRING SURNAMES: OR WHEN DO STATISTICS

END AND WHEN DOES COMMON SENSE TAKE OVER?

To this point we have confined our comments to surnames appearing 5 or more times in our data set.

Those 34,000 surnames encompass 85 percent of the householder population in the SOR file but less

than 15 percent of the number of different surnames appearing in that file. Our goal is to classify

every surname appearing on the SOR file; but for names appearing less than five times the proportion Hispanic should not and will not be the sole criterion for classification. In this section, we outline the thought process used in classifying infrequently occurring surnames. The exact details are

found in Appendix Section 10.2 on page 21.

The 7.2 million record SOR file is a reasonably representative national sample (almost 3 percent) of

persons enumerated in the 1990 Census. In general terms, it is quite possible to designate a surname

as being Heavily Hispanic or Rarely Hispanic from samples of three or possibly even two surnames;

but samples of this size are inappropriate for separating Generally Hispanic from Moderately Hispanic or Moderately Hispanic from Occasionally Hispanic. Table 11 presents data demonstrating

why it is difficult to badly misclassify the ethnicity of a surname when 5 independent observations

of that surname exist.

Assume that we are trying to categorize three separate surnames, and that five independent observations exist for each name. We also happen to know that among all Americans, surname “H” (Heavily) is 90 percent Hispanic; surname “M” (Midway) is 50 percent Hispanic and surname “R” (Rarely)

is 2 percent Hispanic. Table 11 provides binomial probabilities (in percent) of getting 0, 1, 2, 3, 4,

and 5 persons identifying as Hispanic for each of these three surnames.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

TABLE 11—PROBABILITY OF FINDING “X” HISPANICS FROM 

5 INDEPENDENT OBSERVATIONS 

(Numbers in percent)

X Name “H” Name “M” Name “R”

(90%) (50%) (2%)

0 0.0 3.1 90.4

1 0.1 15.6 9.2

2 0.8 31.3 0.4

3 7.3 31.3 0.0

4 32.8 15.6 0.0

5 59.1 3.1 0.0

Armed with this knowledge, it is evident that for Heavily Hispanic (”H”) or Rarely Hispanic (”R”)

surnames there is little chance of misclassifying a surname that occurs 5 times. If our five observation sample were to yield three Hispanics, we might be tempted to classify the surname as “H” when

it should have been “M” or vice versa, but there is little chance that a type “R” name could provide 3

Hispanics in a sample of 5 independent observations.

7.1.1 Classification of 1980 Spanish Surnames Occurring 4 or Fewer Times on the SOR 

Sample. Table 12 presents data on the number of “householders” with Spanish surnames (1980 definition) whose surname surfaced four or fewer times on the SOR file.

TABLE 12—SURNAMES INCLUDED ON THE 1980 SPANISH SURNAME

LIST WHICH APPEAR 4 OR FEWER TIMES ON THE SOR FILE

 Number of Hispanics

Distinct

Surnames Appearances 4 3 2 1 0

424 4 273 91 30 14 16

594 3 401 100 53 40

1143 2 790 229 124

2358 1 1784 574

5882 0

To aid in interpreting Table 12, the 1143 different surnames appearing exactly 2 times on the SOR

sample represent 2286 (2 x 1143) householders. In 790 instances both householders having those

particular surnames identified as Hispanic; in 229 cases one householder with the surname was Hispanic and one was not; in 124 cases neither householder with that surname said they were Hispanic.

Overall, 74.8 percent of Spanish surnamed (1980 list) householders with names appearing exactly

two times on the SOR file self-identified as Hispanic in the 1990 file.

It is especially enlightening to note that nearly one-half (5882) of the 12,497 surnames on the 1980

Spanish surname list did not even occur in the SOR file. For those 5882 names we can not make

any judgement as to whether those names are associated with persons who are Hispanic origin.

There are two reasons why the SOR file did not capture those 5,882 surnames: (1) Many of these

1980 names may have themselves been the result of miskeying (e.g., RODRIGUF); (2) The data

base used in assembling the 1980 list consisted of 80 million observations; this sample uses only 1.8

million records. In any case, the length (number of names) of a surname list has little correlation on

its effectiveness.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Table 13 presents data on the “householders” whose surname occurs 4 or fewer times on the SOR

file and that surname did not appear on the 1980 Spanish surname list.

TABLE 13—SURNAMES THAT ARE NOT INCLUDED ON THE 1980

SPANISH SURNAME LIST AND APPEAR 4 OR FEWER TIMES ON 

THE SOR FILE

 Hispanic Responses

Distinct

Surnames Appearances 4 3 2 1 0

9,056 4 48 34 57 362 8,555

16,115 3 180 142 543 15,250

37,073 2 740 1,146 35,187

165,407 1 9,849 155,558

Since none of the entries appearing in Table 13 was previously (1980 surname list) classified as Hispanic, we would never consider reclassifying surnames included in the far right column of Table 13

into any positive Hispanic category. The names appearing in the remaining cells in Table 13 will be

categorized by more subjective measures described in the Appendix. One possible yardstick for

classifying surnames might have been to extend the binomial expansion appearing in Table 11 to

lesser numbers of sample observations. For example, the probability that 4 independent readings on

a truly Spanish surname (90 percent successful in identifying Hispanics) would yield 1 or 0 Hispanics is 0.3 and 0.0 percent respectively. But we decided against employing the binomial because we

have additional data at our disposal for classifying ethnicity of surnames.

There is a natural predilection to retain any surname appearing on the existing 1980 Spanish surname list unless the evidence for removal is strong. And we don’t want to add additional surnames

to the 1990 list unless there is overriding evidence for doing so. For surnames occurring often, we

feel that the probability of misclassification is minimal, but the chance of misclassifying ethnicity

based only on probabilities rises sharply as the sample shrinks. To aid us in our classification of

surnames we turn to:

7.1.2 Orthographic Structure of Surname and Hispanic Status of Surname in 1980. For names

occurring 4, 3, or even 2 times the entries on the binomial expansion can be of some guidance. But

for surnames with single observations, the binomial expansion is useless. For that reason, we have

assembled two additional items of information to guide us on the classification of surnames. They

are (1) orthographic structure of surnames and (2) whether that surname appeared among the 12,497

surnames on the 1980 Spanish surname list.

7.1.3 Orthographic Structure of Surnames. Linguists, particularly the late Robert W. Buechley

(Buechley, 1961, 1967, 1971, 1976), have observed that certain letter combinations are common

amongst Spanish surnames. The two letter ending EZ as in MARTINEZ, RODRIGUEZ and LOPEZ is almost always indicative of a Spanish surname. But of even greater importance for Spanish

surname classification is the fact that certain letter formations never or almost never occur among

Spanish surnames.

We initially parsed all surnames appearing 5 or more times in the SOR file by the Hispanic classifications described previously. We discovered (not surprisingly) that no surname falling into Heavily,

Generally, or Moderately category contained either a K or a W. Based on that finding, it would be

logical to assume that any surname containing the letter K or W should not be classified Hispanic

regardless of its performance in the SOR sample.

In addition to checking for the appearance of a K and/or W anywhere in the surname we also analyzed opening three letter and closing three letter combinations. The letters SMI as in SMITH and
Technical Working Paper No. 13 13

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

JOH as in JOHNSON never initiated surnames falling into the first 3 Hispanic categories and ITH is

not a Hispanic ending among frequently occurring SOR names. Buechley had previously determined that there are 1465 valid 3 letter starts and 1114 valid 3 letter endings among Spanish surnames. (More information on starts and endings appear in the technical Appendix.)

A third orthographic finding is that double letters excepting R and L just don’t occur. The notable

exceptions are S AA VEDRA, JA SS O, DELO SS ANTOS, and CO TT O. Thus a surname containing a double letter excepting RR and LL should not be classified as Spanish regardless of the

proportion of householders with that surname who are Hispanic in the SOR file.

7.1.4 Hispanic Status of Surname in 1980. A second and final auxiliary item of information used

in determining Hispanic classification for low occurrence surnames in the SOR was the 1980 status.

We felt that the previous research was sound and the knowledge of whether a surname was or was

not Spanish on the previous list was a piece of information to be used in categorizing surnames.

Summary—For frequently occurring surnames (e.g., 5 or more times in the SOR file), we believe

that proportion Hispanic should be the sole means for classifying a surname. For rarely occurring

surnames, there are three indicators used in classifying. They are, listed in importance: (1) proportion Hispanic, (2) orthographic structure, and (3) appearance on 1980 surnames list. See Section

10.2 in the Appendix for additional details on how these three criteria fit into a point value system.

8.0 CONCLUSION

The authors hope that the evidence presented here convinces the reader that a well constructed Spanish surname list is a useful alternative for identifying persons of Hispanic origin when Hispanic origin is not known. In some instances (estimating rate of change in the Hispanic origin population)

defining Spanish origin solely through the use of surname may be preferable to self-designated Hispanic origin because surname provides a “consistent” response.

With very few exceptions every frequently occurring surname is either Heavily Hispanic or Rarely

Hispanic and there is no middle ground. This finding is the determining factor why Spanish surname is such an excellent proxy for identifying Hispanics within the United States. Based on the

analysis of the SOR file, fewer than 1000 surnames are sufficient for capturing 80 percent of the

Hispanic population in the United States. Moreover, householders with those surnames are Hispanic

95 percent of the time.

The Census Bureau has released Spanish surnames following the Censuses of 1950, 1960, 1970, and

1980. This 1990 edition is only another station on an ongoing research journey, but this 1990 product does differ significantly from its predecessors. Each of the 25,277 individual surnames appearing on the electronic file that supplements this report contain auxiliary information allowing prospective users the flexibility to construct their own Spanish surname list if necessary. For example, we

provide data on the surnames SMITH, JONES, and ROBINSON as well as GARCIA, GOMEZ,

and SILVA. Granted, it is unlikely that any one would use this auxiliary information to conclude

that SMITH is a Spanish surname. In theory, we are not providing a Spanish surname “list”. Rather, we provide auxiliary data for each surname that can be sorted into a continuum allowing the prospective user to determine his or her own criteria as to what is or is not a Spanish surname.

If the SOR sample universe was doubled or even tripled (we had 1.9 million households in the SOR

sample), we might have a better measure for classifying surnames that now appear 3 to 5 times. But

a larger sample would also double or triple the number of persons named SMITH and GARCIA

where the current sample size is already sufficient for classifying Hispanic status. Moreover, surnames that do not occur in this sample might appear 1 or 2 times in the larger sample and the problems with infrequently occurring surnames would still remain; only the infrequent surnames would

be different.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

9.0 REFERENCES

1. Word, David L., Jeffrey S. Passel, Beverly D. Causey, and Edward F. Fernandez , “Determining

a List of Spanish Surnames by Analysis of Geographical Distributions.” Unpublished paper

delivered at annual meeting of Southern Regional Demographic Group, San Antonio Texas,

October 1978

2a. Hogan, Howard, “The 1990 Post-Enumeration Survey: Operations and Results,” The Journal

of the American Statistical Association, 88:423, pp. 1047-1060, 1993.

2b. Hogan, Howard, “The 1990 Post-Enumeration Survey: An Overview”, The American Statistician, 46:4, pp. 291-269, 1992.

3. Perkins, R. Colby, “Evaluating the Passel-Word Spanish Surname List: 1990 Decennial Census

Post Enumeration Survey Results.”, Population Estimates and Projections Technical Working

Paper Series, August 1993

4. Passel, Jeffrey S. and David L. Word, “Constructing the List of Spanish Surnames for the 1980

Census: An Application of Bayes’ Theorem”, paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the

Population Association of America, Denver, 1980.

4. Word, David L, “Population Estimates by Race and Hispanic Origin for States, Metropolitan

Areas, and Selected Counties: 1980 to 1985.”, Current Population Reports, Series P-25, No

1040 RD-1, Bureau of the Census, May 1989.

5. McKenney, Nampeo, Claudette Bennett, Roderick Harrison, and Jorge del Pinal, “Evaluating

Racial and Ethnic Reporting in the 1990 Census”, American Statistical Association, Proceedings

of the Section on Survey Research Methods, 1993.

6. Social Security Administration, “Report of Distribution of Surnames in the Social Security

Number File September 1, 1984”, 1984.

7a. Buechley, Robert W., 1961. “A Reproducible Method of Counting Persons of Spanish Surname”, Journal of the American Statistical Association 56 (March 1961)

7b. Buechley, Robert W., 1967. “Characteristic Name Sets of Spanish Populations”, Names 15 (1,

March 1967): 53-69.

7c. Buechley, Robert W., 1971. “Spanish Surnames Among the 2,000 Most Common United States

Surnames”, Names 19, (2, June 1971)

7d. Buechley, Robert W., 1976. “Generally Useful Ethnic Search System: GUESS”, mimeographed

paper, Cancer Research and Treatment Center, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New

Mexico, November 1976.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

10.0 APPENDIX

A significant portion of the Appendix is written for persons requiring electronic access to individual

surname data. Consequently, persons with only a casual interest in Spanish surnames can be adequately served by reading section 10.3 and browsing the contents of Appendix Table A.

10.1 SERVING OUR CUSTOMERS

From talking to prospective customers of Spanish surname data, we conclude that we are serving

two or perhaps even three classes of customers. The three classes include:

10.1.1 Persons who are satisfied with a minimal number of surnames (preferably on a piece of

paper) that adequately cover a large proportion of the Hispanic origin/surnamed population within

the United States. For these persons, we provide 639 Heavily Hispanic Spanish surnames arranged

in alphabetic order in Appendix Table A. Persons with those surnames represent more than twothirds of the Hispanic origin population and approximately 80 percent of the Spanish surnamed population (see Section 5.1 of the main text). The 639 surnames share two characteristics:

(1) For each surname appearing in Appendix Table A, at least 25 SOR “householders” provided

positive responses to the Spanish origin question on their 1990 Census forms.

(2) Each of the 639 surnames listed in Appendix Table A qualify as heavily (75 percent) Hispanic.

Overall, 94 percent of the householders in the United States with those surnames answered the

1990 Hispanic origin question affirmatively.

Note that these criteria do not precisely produce the tabulations appearing in Table 6A. There, we

tabulated responses from 715 surnames that both occurred 25 or more times in the SOR file and

appeared on the 1980 Spanish surname list. None of those 715 surnames were subjected to a minimum standard for percent Hispanic. In fact, one of those 715 surnames (DECASTRO) is now classified as occasional Hispanic.

For a surname to appear in Appendix Table A, we require 25 positive responses in the SOR file and

a minimum Hispanic “hit rate” of 75 percent. Thus a 1980 Spanish surname that appeared 27 times

in the SOR file with 24 positive Hispanic entries would be an entry in Table 6A but not in Appendix

Table A.

For many purposes, this abridged 639 surname list is sufficient for making a reasonably accurate

assessment on the number or proportion Hispanic within a group. Consider an organization of 100

persons. Twenty of the organization’s members have surnames that match the abbreviated 639 entry

surname list. Armed with this information one can reasonably conclude that between 20 and 30

members are Hispanic. The number 30 is derived by dividing matched members (20) by 2/3—the

proportion of the Hispanic population with these 639 surnames. For many/most uses an approximation with this level of accuracy suffices as a “ball park” estimator.

10.1.2 Persons who need surname data in electronic form and want the flexibility of customizing their own Spanish surname lists. The authors have arbitrarily categorized a surname to be

Heavily Hispanic if more than 75 percent of householders with that name are Hispanic. Some users

of Spanish surname data might wish to construct a surname base of Heavily Hispanic names where

the criteria for Heavily is 90 percent, or 60 percent or some intermediate value. These customers

will receive a flat file of 25,276 surnames arranged in nine data fields.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

For purposes of illustration, we provide the contents for four individual names.

Field 1 Field 2 Field 3 Field 4 Field 5 Field 6 Field 7 Field 8 Field 9

0225 SILVA 0 2 710 499 407 344 0.441

0105 FEBUS 0 -2 8 5 7 5 1.875

0325 FELIX 1 2 187 132 88 78 -0.160

5500 BROOKS 0 -6 1714 587 5 4 -2.987

SILVA’s category—0225—indicates that the surname is Generally Hispanic with more than 25 positive occurrences. The name did not appear on the 1980 list, but it does pass the Buechley test. The

surname is much more likely (344/499) to be Hispanic in Hispanic states than non-Hispanic states

(63/211).

FEBUS’s, 0105 classification signifies that the surname is Heavily Hispanic with between 5 and 9

positive occurrences. The surname was not on the 1980 Spanish surname list. The final three letters

in the surname (BUS) do not match the Buechley “Ends”. Of the 8 householders with the name FEBUS, 7 are Hispanic. All 5 householders living in “Spanish States” are Hispanic.

FELIX is similar to SILVA except that the surname FELIX did appear on the 1980 Spanish surname

list. It’s category 0325 indicates that the surname is classified as Moderately Hispanic and there are

more than 25 positive replies to the Hispanic question in the SOR sample.

BROOKS appears on the electronic file because it had at least one (actually 5) positive responses on

the SOR file. The category 5500 indicates that the surname is Rarely Hispanic and that there are at

least 500 negative responses for that surname. BROOKS (as expected) was not on the 1980 Spanish

surname list. The score of -6 for Buechley occurs because of the existence of the letter K, the ending (OKS), and the double OO in the middle of the name.

Field 1 A numeric descriptor (located in positions 1-4) that provides both a Hispanic classification and a frequency grouping. Each of the 25,276 surnames appearing in these files falls

into one and only one of 28 mutually exclusive categories. Appendix Table B (Spanish

Surname Categories) define these 28 groupings.

Field 2 The surname itself—limited to 13 characters and appearing in positions 6 through 18.

Field 3 A “1” or a “0” appearing in column 20. A “1” signifies that this particular surname appears on the 1980 Spanish surname list; a “0” indicates that it did not.

Field 4 A positive “2” in column 24 or a negative even number appearing in columns 22 through

24. A “2” in column 24 signifies that the particular surname passes all the Buechley criteria. (See section 7.1.3 in main text for reference to Robert A. Buechley) A negative 2, 4,

6, 8, or 10 indicates whether the surname violates 1, 2, 3, 4, or even 5 Buechley rules.

Buechley Rule 1 — the letter K anywhere in name

Buechley Rule 2 — the letter W anywhere in name

Buechley Rule 3 — starts (initial 3 letters)

Buechley Rule 4 — ends (final 3 letters)

Buechley Rule 5 — double letters (excepting rr and $$)

Field 5 Total number of householders in the SOR File possessing the surname appearing in Field

2. Columns 25 through 30.

Field 6 Number of householders in the SOR file residing in one of the 11 states with large numbers of Hispanics. Columns 31 through 35.

We define the following 11 states to contain a large number of Hispanics: 1. Arizona, 2.

California, 3. Colorado, 4. Connecticut, 5. Florida, 6. Illinois, 7. New Jersey, 8. New

Mexico, 9. New York, 10. Pennsylvania, and 11. Texas.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Field 7 Total householders (national) with this surname who provide a positive response to the

Spanish origin question. Columns 36 through 40. The ratio of the entry in Field 7 to the

entry in Field 5 generates national Hispanic proportions for that particular surname.

Field 8 Hispanic householders in 11 States with large numbers of Hispanics. Columns 41 through

45. The ratio of the entry in Field 8 to the entry in Field 6 yields the Hispanic proportion

for those 11 States.

Field 9 “Point Value of Surname” An integer (possibly preceded by a negative sign), decimal

point, followed by three digits appears in columns 47 through 52. Although each and

every one of the 25,276 surnames appearing in the electronic file is assigned a point value, that point value is only germane for classifying surnames when the number of positive

and negative responses is fewer than 5.

10.1.3 Customers who want surname data in electronic form, but are willing to accept census

“Hispanic” classifications. For those customers, we provide a file of surnames arranged in strict

alphabetic order with the same 9 data fields described above. The major difference is that the number of surnames is limited to the 12,215 names which are classified as Heavily Hispanic. In addition

to the surname data described above, we also furnish two additional tables which are:

(2) Electronic Table 3—STARTS is a file of 1465 three letter combination which start Spanish surname.

(3) Electronic Table 4—ENDS is a file of Buechley’s 1114 three letter combinations which end

Spanish surname.

The entries appearing in STARTS and ENDS are primarily a product of Buechley’s research; but

Passel and Word uncovered some inconsistencies which were relayed to Buechley in 1978. This

version of STARTS and ENDS does not incorporate those additions to Buechley’s original work.

10.2 POINT VALUES FOR INFREQUENTLY OCCURRING SURNAMES

In Section 7.0 of this paper (Rarely Occurring Surnames: or Where Do Statistics End and When

Does Common Sense Take Over?) we allude to the fact that proportion Hispanic would not and

could not be the sole determinant for whether a prospective surname is Spanish and to which of the

five categories (Heavily, Generally, Moderately, Occasionally, and Rarely) the surname is assigned.

From rereading the description of Field 9 in Section 10.1.2, it is immediately clear that any surname

appearing 9 or more times is classified solely on the basis of proportion Spanish and any surname

with fewer than 5 householder occurrences will be classified on the basis of point value. Some

names appearing 5 to 9 times in the SOR file are assigned a Hispanic category based on proportion

Hispanic while other surnames with 5 to 9 SOR appearances are classified only on point value.

As described in Section 7.0 there are three characteristics that can be used to classify a surname.

These characteristics are:

(1) proportion of times possessor of surname is Spanish, (2) whether or not the surname follows acceptable Spanish language constructions, and (3) whether or not the 1980 research assigned that surname to be Spanish. We assigned points for each of these three attributes, with the assignment following the order described below:

1. For “householders” with a given surname captured in the SOR sample, how often does the possessor of that surname provide a positive Hispanic response? Give each Hispanic response a value of

+3 and each non-Hispanic response a value of negative 3.
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U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

2. Does the surname adhere to or violate “orthographic correctness?” If the surname follows all 5

orthographic rules assign the surname a value of +2; assign a value of -2 for each violation.

For example, DAVIS (which could be pronounced Dah Vees) violates no orthographic

precepts. The starting three letters D A V appear in DAVILLA, the ending three letters V

I S occur in OROVIS. DAVIS contains no W’s, no K’s, nor does it contain a double letter. All five American surnames occurring more frequently than DAVIS (eg. SMITH,

JOHNSON, WILLIAMS, BROWN, and JONES) violate at least one of the orthographic

rules which typify “Spanish” surnames.

3. Did the surname appear on the Census Bureau’s 1980 Spanish Surname List? Give the surname a

value of +1 if yes, and a value of -1 if no.

The point value of the surname is defined to be total points divided by total occurrences. If a name

occurs only once, it could have a value as high as +6.00, and a theoretical low of -14.00. For example, the surname WEEKS receives -10 points on the orthographic variable alone. For frequently

occurring surnames, the number of points awarded for orthographics and appearance on the 1980

Spanish surname list has very little weight. We illustrate this point with a surname occurring 100

times and a success rate of 95 percent.

AN ILLUSTRATION OF POINT SCORE CALCULATION: 

Based on 100 observations

Answers Points Awarded

Yes No Yes No Total

(1) Response to Spanish origin question 95 5 285 -15 270

(2) Orthographics 1 2 2

(3) Appearance on 1980 List 1 1 1

Total Points 288 -15 273

Point Score 2.73

A frequently occurring Heavily Hispanic surname will achieve a point value ranging between 1.5

and 3.0. Point values of 2.5 to 2.7 are typical. The Heavily Hispanic standard for infrequently occurring surnames is set at equal to or greater than 2.00. It is possible for a surname appearing exactly one time on the SOR file with a single positive Spanish response to fall in the Heavily Hispanic

category even though the surname did not appear on the 1980 Spanish surname list. But that surname must satisfy all five orthographic principles to receive the Heavily Hispanic designation.

The point values for Generally Hispanic were set at +1.00 to +1.99. The bounds for Moderately

Hispanic were pegged from -0.50 to +0.99. As might be expected, the point values used in classifying infrequently occurring surnames parallel the values for frequently occurring surnames. We decided that it was virtually impossible to make an Occasionally Hispanic determination for infrequently occurring surnames. For that reason Spanish categories 0401 and 0402 (Appendix Table B)

do not exist.
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10.3 COMPARING HEAVILY HISPANIC WITH RARELY 

HISPANIC SURNAMES

Here we compare attributes of surnames for category 125—surnames with at least 25 Hispanic responses that are more than 75 percent Hispanic with category 5500 (surnames with more than 500

non-Hispanic responses that are less than 5 percent Hispanic). Data for the remaining 26 categories

can be found in Appendix Table C.

Category 125 5500

Number of Surnames 639 353

Number of Observations 115,526 522,614

Percent Hispanic 94.2 0.7

Percent residing in Spanish States 86.3 37.2

Percent Passing Buechley 99.8 21.8

Percent on 1980 List 100.0 0.0

The analytic data associated with these most diverse categories of surnames aptly illustrate the points

that we have made throughout the text.

1. Nearly 95 percent (94.2) of the male householder population with commonly “acknowledged”

Spanish surnames identified themselves as Hispanic in the 1990 Census. Less than 1 percent of

male householders with the most frequently occurring “non-Spanish” surname identified as Hispanic in the 1990 Census.

2. 86.3 percent of the persons possessing commonly “acknowledged” Spanish surnames reside in

11 states. The 1990 Census found 87.7 percent of the Hispanic origin population living in those

same 11 states. By contrast, only 37 percent of persons with Anglo surnames reside in those

same 11 states.

3. For the 639 surnames appearing in Appendix Table A, there are 638 surnames (99.8 percent)

adhering to the Buechley rules. The one exception (COTTO) contains a double T. Although

Buechley’s rules reject all doubletons except RR and LL, Spanish surnames containing a double

T have been found in the SOR file.

4. Finally, all of the 639 most frequently occurring Spanish surnames were previously (1980) classified as Spanish. Not one of the 353 frequently occurring “Anglo” names were ever candidates

for inclusion on a Spanish surname list.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 20

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

APPENDIX TABLE A: 639 MOST FREQUENTLY OCCURRING

HEAVILY HISPANIC SURNAMES

(Number to right of surname indicates relative ranking among Spanish surnames)

Abeyta 476 Baca 157 Carrion 340 Dominguez 63 Guardado 587

Abrego 534 Badillo 515 Carvajal 478 Dominquez 448 Guerra 85

Abreu 416 Baez 193 Casanova 419 Duarte 201 Guerrero 54

Acevedo 112 Baeza 456 Casares 600 Duenas 499 Guevara 211

Acosta 60 Bahena 616 Casarez 458 Duran 76 Guillen 311

Acuna 370 Balderas 359 Casas 341 Echevarria 394 Gurule 539

Adame 326 Ballesteros 552 Casillas 271 Elizondo 379 Gutierrez 24

Adorno 549 Banda 339 Castaneda 123 Enriquez 173 Guzman 43

Agosto 597 Banuelos 378 Castellanos 261 Escalante 349 Haro 471

Aguayo 409 Barajas 220 Castillo 25 Escamilla 275 Henriquez 480

Aguilar 45 Barela 405 Castro 37 Escobar 139 Heredia 336

Aguilera 243 Barragan 526 Cavazos 228 Escobedo 244 Hernadez 528

Aguirre 104 Barraza 381 Cazares 406 Esparza 169 Hernandes 520

Alanis 598 Barrera 111 Ceballos 498 Espinal 500 Hernandez 5

Alaniz 267 Barreto 497 Cedillo 571 Espino 469 Herrera 33

Alarcon 364 Barrientos 432 Ceja 410 Espinosa 143 Hidalgo 282

Alba 404 Barrios 200 Centeno 459 Espinoza 68 Hinojosa 229

Alcala 424 Batista 418 Cepeda 467 Esquibel 460 Holguin 372

Alcantar 567 Becerra 226 Cerda 296 Esquivel 231 Huerta 188

Alcaraz 599 Beltran 158 Cervantes 99 Estevez 619 Hurtado 253

Alejandro 550 Benavides 208 Cervantez 479 Estrada 52 Ibarra 114

Aleman 347 Benavidez 310 Chacon 213 Fajardo 382 Iglesias 489

Alfaro 207 Benitez 172 Chapa 247 Farias 428 Irizarry 233

Alicea 303 Bermudez 227 Chavarria 306 Feliciano 205 Jaime 442

Almanza 387 Bernal 168 Chavez 22 Fernandez 29 Jaimes 588

Almaraz 551 Berrios 299 Cintron 348 Ferrer 360 Jaquez 553

Almonte 614 Betancourt 290 Cisneros 135 Fierro 395 Jaramillo 171

Alonso 238 Blanco 163 Collado 536 Figueroa 59 Jasso 472

Alonzo 264 Bonilla 153 Collazo 318 Flores 13 Jimenez 35

Altamirano 466 Borrego 398 Colon 53 Florez 429 Jiminez 490

Alva 568 Botello 516 Colunga 434 Fonseca 335 Juarez 78

Alvarado 56 Bravo 194 Concepcion 426 Franco 116 Jurado 603

Alvarez 27 Briones 457 Contreras 71 Frias 461 Laboy 540

Amador 281 Briseno 433 Cordero 180 Fuentes 97 Lara 94

Amaya 265 Brito 333 Cordova 142 Gaitan 573 Laureano 604

Anaya 195 Bueno 316 Cornejo 441 Galarza 449 Leal 176

Anguiano 477 Burgos 209 Corona 186 Galindo 179 Lebron 400

Angulo 438 Bustamante 274 Coronado 221 Gallardo 232 Ledesma 300

Aparicio 535 Bustos 399 Corral 353 Gallegos 73 Leiva 622

Apodaca 273 Caballero 268 Corrales 601 Galvan 125 Lemus 297

Aponte 236 Caban 439 Correa 159 Galvez 307 Leon 95

Aragon 230 Cabrera 105 Cortes 175 Gamboa 354 Lerma 322

Arana 581 Cadena 440 Cortez 64 Gamez 302 Leyva 258

Aranda 285 Caldera 582 Cotto 468 Gaona 501 Limon 383

Arce 288 Calderon 107 Covarrubias 518 Garay 538 Linares 368

Archuleta 289 Calvillo 617 Crespo 278 Garcia 1 Lira 401

Arellano 190 Camacho 98 Cruz 17 Garibay 527 Llamas 554

Arenas 525 Camarillo 425 Cuellar 246 Garica 620 Loera 412

Arevalo 321 Campos 84 Curiel 572 Garrido 430 Lomeli 555

Arguello 569 Canales 260 Davila 129 Garza 26 Longoria 192

Arias 166 Candelaria 366 Deanda 584 Gastelum 586 Lopez 4

Armas 615 Cano 167 Dejesus 131 Gaytan 462 Lovato 502

Armendariz 447 Cantu 102 Delacruz 151 Gil 262 Loya 420

Armenta 417 Caraballo 317 Delafuente 585 Giron 411 Lozada 541

Armijo 377 Carbajal 367 Delagarza 371 Godinez 388 Lozano 122

Arredondo 212 Cardenas 106 Delao 602 Godoy 621 Lucero 124

Arreola 365 Cardona 214 Delapaz 537 Gomez 15 Lucio 481

Arriaga 397 Carmona 252 Delarosa 164 Gonzales 12 Luevano 491

Arroyo 132 Carranza 269 Delatorre 237 Gonzalez 6 Lugo 137

Arteaga 332 Carrasco 210 Deleon 81 Gracia 389 Lujan 215

Atencio 496 Carrasquillo 570 Delgadillo 427 Granado 519 Luna 66

Avalos 250 Carreon 583 Delgado 46 Granados 350 Macias 115

Avila 86 Carrera 517 Delrio 393 Griego 435 Madera 542

Aviles 245 Carrero 618 Delvalle 334 Grijalva 470 Madrid 185

Ayala 65 Carrillo 77 Diaz 14 Guajardo 308 Madrigal 270
Technical Working Paper No. 13 21

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

APPENDIX TABLE A: 639 MOST FREQUENTLY OCCURRING

HEAVILY HISPANIC SURNAMES

(Number to right of surname indicates relative ranking among Spanish surnames)

Maestas 304 Nazario 545 Posada 593 Salcedo 532 Vaca 636

Magana 248 Negrete 324 Prado 294 Salcido 309 Valadez 330

Malave 521 Negron 216 Preciado 531 Saldana 219 Valdes 240

Maldonado 51 Nevarez 369 Prieto 313 Saldivar 445 Valdez 47

Manzanares 623 Nieto 251 Puente 358 Salgado 184 Valdivia 524

Mares 402 Nieves 120 Puga 609 Salinas 80 Valencia 127

Marin 177 Nino 626 Pulido 444 Samaniego 511 Valentin 257

Marquez 61 Noriega 344 Quesada 484 Sanabria 454 Valenzuela 110

Marrero 178 Nunez 58 Quezada 292 Sanches 431 Valladares 577

Marroquin 312 Ocampo 355 Quinones 146 Sanchez 8 Valle 235

Martinez 2 Ocasio 361 Quinonez 413 Sandoval 55 Vallejo 386

Mascarenas 589 Ochoa 91 Quintana 140 Santacruz 631 Valles 396

Mata 138 Ojeda 255 Quintanilla 277 Santana 117 Valverde 548

Mateo 503 Olivares 272 Quintero 162 Santiago 41 Vanegas 637

Matias 529 Olivarez 305 Quiroz 218 Santillan 562 Varela 223

Matos 202 Olivas 291 Rael 463 Sarabia 632 Vargas 36

Maya 556 Olivera 558 Ramirez 10 Sauceda 512 Vasquez 23

Mayorga 605 Olivo 475 Ramon 407 Saucedo 239 Vazquez 62

Medina 30 Olmos 507 Ramos 20 Sedillo 594 Vega 49

Medrano 191 Olvera 276 Rangel 133 Segovia 523 Vela 182

Mejia 93 Ontiveros 301 Rascon 610 Segura 241 Velasco 293

Melendez 109 Oquendo 530 Raya 561 Sepulveda 280 Velasquez 96

Melgar 624 Ordonez 421 Razo 492 Serna 249 Velazquez 130

Mena 323 Orellana 443 Regalado 403 Serrano 89 Velez 83

Menchaca 482 Ornelas 283 Rendon 287 Serrato 612 Veliz 578

Mendez 39 Orosco 452 Renteria 256 Sevilla 613 Venegas 375

Mendoza 32 Orozco 147 Resendez 485 Sierra 187 Vera 197

Menendez 337 Orta 436 Reyes 19 Sisneros 563 Verdugo 579

Meraz 543 Ortega 50 Reyna 149 Solano 315 Verduzco 638

Mercado 103 Ortiz 16 Reynoso 325 Solis 90 Vergara 495

Merino 557 Osorio 338 Rico 295 Soliz 385 Viera 415

Mesa 342 Otero 174 Rincon 522 Solorio 446 Vigil 136

Meza 156 Ozuna 559 Riojas 574 Solorzano 564 Villa 134

Miramontes 606 Pabon 590 Rios 48 Soria 437 Villagomez 465

Miranda 79 Pacheco 92 Rivas 88 Sosa 118 Villalobos 225

Mireles 298 Padilla 57 Rivera 9 Sotelo 328 Villalpando 596

Mojica 343 Padron 508 Rivero 373 Soto 34 Villanueva 145

Molina 67 Paez 607 Robledo 509 Suarez 101 Villareal 423

Mondragon 450 Pagan 148 Robles 82 Tafoya 455 Villarreal 87

Monroy 544 Palacios 181 Rocha 121 Tamayo 414 Villasenor 392

Montalvo 254 Palomino 627 Rodarte 493 Tamez 595 Villegas 165

Montanez 286 Palomo 591 Rodrigez 629 Tapia 141 Yanez 266

Montano 203 Pantoja 356 Rodriguez 3 Tejada 513 Ybarra 189

Montemayor 504 Paredes 357 Rodriquez 38 Tejeda 464 Zambrano 488

Montenegro 505 Parra 217 Rojas 74 Tellez 352 Zamora 108

Montero 351 Partida 453 Rojo 510 Tello 565 Zamudio 639

Montes 154 Patino 345 Roldan 391 Teran 633 Zapata 224

Montez 451 Paz 327 Rolon 611 Terrazas 533 Zaragoza 376

Montoya 70 Pedraza 592 Romero 28 Tijerina 362 Zarate 331

Mora 119 Pedroza 422 Romo 222 Tirado 329 Zavala 170

Morales 18 Pelayo 546 Roque 486 Toledo 363 Zayas 514

Moreno 31 Pena 42 Rosado 144 Toro 346 Zelaya 580

Mota 483 Perales 384 Rosales 113 Torres 11 Zepeda 234

Moya 279 Peralta 263 Rosario 126 Torrez 242 Zuniga 155

Munguia 506 Perea 390 Rosas 152 Tovar 204

Muniz 160 Peres 560 Roybal 408 Trejo 206

Munoz 40 Perez 7 Rubio 128 Trevino 72

Murillo 183 Pichardo 608 Ruelas 630 Trujillo 69

Muro 625 Pina 196 Ruiz 21 Ulibarri 566

Najera 319 Pineda 161 Ruvalcaba 575 Ulloa 494

Naranjo 473 Pizarro 628 Saavedra 314 Urbina 374

Narvaez 474 Polanco 320 Saenz 199 Urena 634

Nava 198 Ponce 150 Saiz 487 Urias 576

Navarrete 380 Porras 547 Salas 100 Uribe 284

Navarro 75 Portillo 259 Salazar 44 Urrutia 635
Technical Working Paper No. 13 22

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

APPENDIX TABLE B: SPANISH SURNAME CATEGORIES

In Section 10.1.2 we described the file layout of the nine data fields associated with each surname.

Now we concentrate on data field 1. The first two characters in field 1 denote Hispanic classification (01 for Heavily, 02 for Generally, 03 for Moderately, 04 for Occasionally and 05 for Rarely).

The 3rd and 4th characters represent a frequency indicator.

When the frequency indicator (positions 3 and 4) takes on numerical values 05 through 25 (05, 10,

15, 25), Hispanic classification (Heavily, Generally, etc.) is determined strictly on the basis of proportion Hispanic as described in Section 5 of the text. When the frequency indicators are 01 or 02,

(those names with 4 or fewer positive or negative) responses), we need to be more innovative. See

Point Values for Infrequently Occurring Surnames. (Section 10.2 of this Appendix.)

Heavily Hispanic Surnames

Category Entries Description

0125 639 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with at least 25 positive 

Hispanic responses.

0115 251 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with at least 15 but no more than 

24 positive responses.

0110 263 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with at least 10 but no more than 

14 positive responses.

0105 625 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with at least 5 but no more than 

9 positive responses.

0102 2463 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with at least 2 but no more than 

4 positive responses.

0101 7974 Surnames that are Heavily Hispanic with exactly 1 positive Hispanic

response.

Generally Hispanic Surnames

Category Entries Description

0225 39 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with at least 25 positive Hispanic

responses.

0215 25 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with at least 15 but no more than

24 positive responses.

0210 25 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with at least 10 but no more than

14 positive responses.

0205 106 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with at least 5 but no more than 

9 positive responses.

0202 354 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with at least 2 but no more than 

4 positive responses.

0201 218 Surnames that are Generally Hispanic with exactly 1 positive Hispanic

response.

Moderately Hispanic Surnames

Category Entries Description

0325 11 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with at least 25 positive Hispanic

responses.

0315 10 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with at least 15 but no more than

24 positive responses.

0310 21 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with at least 10 but no more than

14 positive responses.

0305 68 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with at least 5 but no more than

9 positive responses.

0302 260 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with at least 2 but no more than

4 positive responses.

0301 3611 Surnames that are Moderately Hispanic with exactly 1 positive Hispanic

response.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 23

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

Appendix Table B (continued)

For reasons cited in “Point Values for Infrequently Occurring Surnames”, Hispanic surname 

categories 0401 and 0402 do not exist.

Occasionally Hispanic Surnames

Category Entries Description

0425 5 Surnames that are Occasionally Hispanic with at least 25 positive 

Hispanic responses.

0415 13 Surnames that are Occasionally Hispanic with at least 15 but no 

more than 24 positive responses.

0410 16 Surnames that are Occasionally Hispanic with at least 10 but no 

more than 14 positive responses.

0405 65 Surnames that are Occasionally Hispanic with at least 5 but no more 

than 9 positive Hispanic responses.

Rarely Hispanic Surnames

Category Entries Description

5500 353 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 500 negative responses

and 1 or more positive Hispanic responses.

5100 1141 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 100 but no more than

499 negative responses and 1 or more positive responses.

5025 1411 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 25 but no more than 

99 negative responses and 1 or more positive responses.

5010 986 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 10 but no more than 

24 negative responses and at least 1 but no more than 4 positive 

responses.

5005 969 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 5 but no more than 

9 negative responses and at least 1 positive response.

 5001 3354 Surnames that are Rarely Hispanic with at least 1 but no more than 

4 negative responses and at least 1 positive Hispanic response.

Category 5001 may include some surnames with 0 positive responses (and 1 to 4 negative responses) provided that that surname exists on the 1980 Spanish surname list.

The careful reader may have already realized that the 28 categories listed here do not encompass

every surname appearing on the SOR file. For example a surname with 2 positive Hispanic responses and 50 negative responses would be tabulated in category 5025. Another surname with 0

(zero) positive responses and 50 negative responses would not be tabulated in any of the 28 categories. In fact, no surname with zero positive Hispanic responses in the SOR file (excepting surnames

classified as Spanish in 1980) appear in Appendix Table B.

Because of this convention, the summary tabulations shown in Appendix Table C tend to overstate

the proportion Hispanic within the Rarely Hispanic Classification. This phenomena is most noticeable with infrequently occurring surnames.
Technical Working Paper No. 13 24

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

APPENDIX TABLE C: SELECTED SUMMARY STATISTICS FOR

SPANISH SURNAMES

Heavily Hispanic

Category 101 102 105 110 115 125

Number of Names 7974 2463 625 263 251 639

Occurrences 7974 6626 4300 3295 5080 115526

Percent Hispanic 100.0 96.1 94.8 94.6 93.5 94.2

Percent in Spanish State 82.9 86.2 85.9 86.6 86.2 86.3

Percent Buechley-Yes 99.4 97.1 98.4 99.2 100.0 99.8

Percent on 1980 List 22.3 69.2 93.0 97.3 100.0 100.0

Generally Hispanic

Category 201 202 205 210 215 225

Number of Names 218 354 106 25 25 39

Occurrences 436 1041 1046 449 726 4038

Percent Hispanic 50.0 77.9 64.8 64.6 63.8 64.0

Percent in Spanish State 76.1 78.6 78.4 77.3 75.5 73.8

Percent Buechley-Yes 100.0 50.6 92.5 100.0 100.0 97.4

Percent on 1980 List 100.0 14.1 71.7 68.0 68.0 66.7

Moderately Hispanic

Category 301 302 305 310 315 325

Number of Names 3611 260 68 21 10 11

Occurrences 4288 1345 1187 640 522 1190

Percent Hispanic 71.4 49.7 37.2 39.2 38.1 39.6

Percent in Spanish State 75.2 69.2 65.9 65.6 60.7 61.7

Percent Buechley-Yes 32.2 82.7 94.1 90.5 100.0 100.0

Percent on 1980 List 17.0 34.6 25.0 14.3 10.0 9.1

Occasionally Hispanic

Category 405 410 415 425

Number of Names 65 16 13 5

Occurrences 3265 1445 2253 1375

Percent Hispanic 12.6 12.1 11.5 17.7

Percent in Spanish State 53.7 51.9 56.3 39.1

Percent Buechley-Yes 72.3 87.5 100.0 80.0

Percent on 1980 List 1.5 0.0 0.0 0.0

Rarely Hispanic

Category 5001 5005 5010 5025 5100 5500

Number of Names 3354 969 986 1411 1141 353

Occurrences 7940 7642 16689 74881 249666 522614

Percent Hispanic 41.5 15.6 7.7 2.5 1.0 0.7

Percent in Spanish State 62.4 54.6 48.2 41.0 38.4 37.2

Percent Buechley-Yes 22.9 44.6 39.1 31.1 24.8 21.8

Percent on 1980 List 7.0 3.2 1.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Technical Working Paper No. 13 25

U.S. Census Bureau March 1996

It is important to note the low proportion of surnames in categories 102 (69.2 percent) and 101 (22.3

percent) that were classified as Hispanic in 1980. The evidence (proportion Hispanic, a pass on

Buechley, and residence in 11 states where most Hispanic reside) suggests that the majority of persons possessing these names are borne by persons of Hispanic origin. But an examination of those

surnames on a case by case basis suggests that the precise spelling of many of the names is incorrect.

In other words, the sizeable number of surnames recorded as VILLANVEVA are almost assuredly a

misinterpretation of VILLANUEVA.

POPULATION DIVISION WORKING PAPER SERIES

NO. 1 - “The Census Bureau Approach for Allocating International Migration to States, Counties,

and Places: 1981-1991.” David L. Word. October 1992.

NO. 2 - “Geographic Coding of Administrative Records—Past Experience and Current Research.”

Douglas K. Sater. April 1993.

NO. 3 - “Postcensal Population Estimates: States, Counties, and Places.” John F. Long. August

1993.

NO. 4 - “Evaluating the Passel-Word Spanish Surname List: 1990 Decennial Census Post Enumeration Survey Results.” R. Colby Perkins. August 1993.

NO. 5 - “Evaluation of Postcensal County Estimates for the 1980s.” Sam T. Davis. March 1994.

NO. 6 - “Metropolitan Growth and Expansion in the 1980s.” Richard L. Forstall and James D.

Fitzsimmons. April 1993.

NO. 7 - “Geographic Coding of Administrative Records — Current Research in ZIP/Sector-toCounty Coding Process.” Douglas K. Sater. June 1994.

NO. 8 - “Illustrative Ranges of the Distribution of Undocumented Immigrants by State.” Edward

W. Fernandez & J. Gregory Robinson. October 1994.

NO. 9 - “Estimates of Emigration of the Foreign-Born Population: 1980-1990.” Bashir Ahmed

and J. Gregory Robinson. December 1994.

NO. 10 - “Estimation of the Annual Emigration of U.S. Born Persons by Using Foreign Censuses

and Selected Administrative Data: Circa 1980.” Edward W. Fernandez. January 1995.

NO. 11 - “Using Analytic Techniques to Evaluate the 1990 Census Coverage of Young Hispanics.”

Edward W. Fernandez. May 1995.

NO. 12 - “Metropolitan and Nonmetropolitan Areas: New Approaches to Geographical Definition.”

Donald C. Dahmann and James D. Fitzsimmons. October 1995.

NO. 13 - “Building a Spanish Surname List for the 1990’s—A New Approach to An Old Problem.”

David L. Word and R. Colby Perkins, Jr. February 1996.

For copies of these Working Papers, please contact author at: Population Division, Bureau of the

Census, Washington, DC 20233.