The KELLEY surname in the USA

Frequency Comparisons
	Total	Rank	Frequency %	Per million people
United States
United States (Current snapshot)	137,555	184	0.051	510
United States (1880 census)	47,415	81	0.095	948
Change since 1880	+90140	-103	-0.044	-438
Other Countries
Australia	601	2694	0.004	37
United Kingdom	1,791	3229	0.004	39

Top States for KELLEY by Total
State	Total	Rank in State	Frequency %	Per million people
Texas	10,952	205	0.053	525
California	9,376	321	0.028	277
Florida	8,148	192	0.051	510
Massachusetts	7,186	43	0.113	1,132
Ohio	6,410	148	0.056	565
Top States for KELLEY by Frequency
State	Total	Rank in State	Frequency %	Per million people
Maine	1,850	65	0.145	1,451
Alabama	6,387	79	0.144	1,436
Massachusetts	7,186	43	0.113	1,132
New Hampshire	1,232	63	0.100	997
Vermont	568	75	0.093	933

Notes

Total is the total number of people with that surname.
Rank is the position in the list of names ordered by total (eg, a rank of 1 means that it's the most common name, and a rank of 10 means it's the tenth most common, etc).
Frequency is the percentage of people with that surname.
Per million people is the number of people with that surname per million of the population.

'A figure of zero indicates that we don't have data for this name (usually because it's quite uncommon and our stats don't go down that far). It doesn't mean that there's no-one with that name at all!

For less common surnames, the figures get progressively less reliable the fewer holders of that name there are. This data is aggregated from several public lists, and some stats are interpolated from known values. The margin of error is well over 100% at the rarest end of the table!

For less common surnames, the frequency and "per million" values may be 0 even though there are people with that name. That's because they represent less than one in a million of the population, which ends up as 0 after rounding.

It's possible for a surname to gain in rank and/or total while being less common per million people (or vice versa) as there are now more surnames in the USA as a result of immigration. In mathematical terms, the tail has got longer, with a far larger number of less common surnames.

Figures for top states show firstly the states where most people called KELLEY live. This obviously tends to be biased towards the most populous states. The second set of figures show where people called KELLEY represent the biggest proportion of the population. So, in this case, there are more people called KELLEY in Texas than any other state, but you are more likely to find a KELLEY by picking someone at random in Maine than anywhere else.

Classification and Origin of KELLEY

Region of origin: British Isles

Country of origin: England

Language of origin: English

Ethnic origin: English

Religious origin: Christian

Name derivation: Location or Geographical Feature

Data for religion and/or language relates to the culture in which the KELLEY surname originated. It does not necessarily have any correlation with the language spoken, or religion practised, by the majority of current American citizens with that name.

Data for ethnic origin relates to the region and country in which the KELLEY surname originated. It does not necessarily have any correlation with the ethnicity of the majority of current American citizens with that name.

Ethnic distribution of KELLEY in the USA

Classification	Total	Percent
Native American/Alaskan	853	0.62
Asian/Pacific	647	0.47
White (Caucasian)	118,036	85.81
Black/African American	14,044	10.21
Mixed Race	2,091	1.52
White (Hispanic)	1,898	1.38

Ethnic distribution data shows the number and percentage of people with the KELLEY surname who reported their ethnic background as being in these broad categories in the most recent national census.

Meaning of KELLEY in historical publications

KELLY. KELLEY. The Kelleys were in old times resident in the parish of that name in Devonshire, and the Irish Kellys, now very numerous, bear the same arms. According to the genenlogy in B.L.G., the Kellys of Kelly " may look back beyond the Conquest and derive themselves from the ancient Britons !" Mr. Shirley says: " Kelly is a manor in the hundred of Lifton, about six miles from Tavistock. The manor and advowson have been in the family at least from the thue of Henry II, and here they have uninterruptedly resided since that very early period." Noble and Gentle Men, p. 59. Tlie similar name Kellie is a diminutive of Charles. See Kell.

Lower, Mark A (1860) Patronymica Britannica: a dictionary of the family names of the United Kingdom. London: J.R. Smith. Public Domain.

Similar names to KELLEY

The following names have similar spellings or pronunciations as KELLEY.

This does not necessarily imply a direct relationship between the names, but may indicate names that could be mistaken for this one when written down or misheard.