FORD Surname Meaning and Origin

The Ford surname is generally believed to have originated as  a name bestowed on someone who lived near a ford or river crossing, from the Old English ford, meaning pass or crossing. Ford may also have derived from English places named Ford, such as Ford in Northumberland, Ford in Somerset, Ford in Shropshire, Ford in West Sussex and Forde in Dorset.   According to the Dictionary of American Family Names, it is also possible that the use of the surname Ford arose in a particular family as an Anglicization of one of several Irish surnames, including  Mac Giolla na Naomh  (a personal name meaning servant of the saints)  and  Mac Conshà ¡mha (a personal name comprised of the elements con, meaning dog and  snà ¡mh, meaning to swim),  whose  final syllable  was once wrongly thought to be the Irish  Ãƒ ¡th, meaning  ford, as well as  Ãƒâ€œ Fuar(th)à ¡in, meaning cold little ford, derived from fuar, meaning cold. Surname Origin: English Alternate Surname Spellings: FORDE, FFORDE, FOARD, FOORD Where in the World is the FORDSurname Found? While it originated in the Netherlands, the Ford  surname is now most prevalent in the United States, according to surname distribution data from Forebears. However, it is also somewhat common in Chile and Columbia. The name was more common in the United States during the 1880s than it is now, especially in the states of New York and New Jersey. The Ford  surname is now most common based on percentage in the U.S. states of Alaska, Arkansas, New Jersey, Illinois, and Connecticut, according to  WorldNames PublicProfiler.   Famous People with the Last Name FORD Gerald Ford - 38th president of the United StatesTennessee Ernie Ford -  American recording artist and television hostJohn Ford -  American  Academy Award-winning director, best known for WesternsGlenn Ford (Gwyllyn Samuel Newton Ford) - Canadian-born American actorHenry Ford -  American industrialist and  founder of the Ford Motor Company Genealogy Resources for the Surname FORD Ford Surname DNA ProjectOver 300 members have joined this DNA surname project which uses Y-DNA, mtDNA and autosomal DNA to piece together various Ford lines back to common ancestors. Common English Surnames: Meanings and OriginsLearn about the four types of English surnames, plus explore the meaning and origin of the 100 most common English last names. Ford Family Crest - Its Not What You ThinkContrary to what you may hear, there is no such thing as a Ford  family crest or coat of arms for the Ford surname.  Coats of arms are granted to individuals, not families, and may rightfully be used only by the uninterrupted male line descendants of the person to whom the coat of arms was originally granted. FamilySearch - FORD GenealogyExplore over 4 million  historical records and lineage-linked family trees posted for the Ford surname and its variations on the free FamilySearch website, hosted by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. FORD  Surname Family Mailing ListsRootsWeb hosts several free mailing lists for researchers of the Ford  surname. DistantCousin.com - FORD Genealogy Family HistoryExplore free databases and genealogy links for the last name Ford. The Ford Genealogy and Family Tree PageBrowse genealogy records and links to genealogical and historical records for individuals with the popular last name Ford from the website of Genealogy Today.----------------------- References: Surname Meanings Origins Cottle, Basil.  Penguin Dictionary of Surnames. Baltimore, MD: Penguin Books, 1967. Dorward, David.  Scottish Surnames. Collins Celtic (Pocket edition), 1998. Fucilla, Joseph.  Our Italian Surnames. Genealogical Publishing Company, 2003. Hanks, Patrick and Flavia Hodges.  A Dictionary of Surnames. Oxford University Press, 1989. Hanks, Patrick.  Dictionary of American Family Names. Oxford University Press, 2003. Reaney, P.H.  A Dictionary of English Surnames. Oxford University Press, 1997. Smith, Elsdon C.  American Surnames. Genealogical Publishing Company, 1997. Back toGlossary of Surname Meanings Origins