The KIRK surname in the USA

Frequency Comparisons
	Total	Rank	Frequency %	Per million people
United States
United States (Current snapshot)	52,056	582	0.019	193
United States (1880 census)	13,257	445	0.027	265
Change since 1880	+38799	-137	-0.008	-72
Other Countries
Australia	2,901	538	0.018	177
United Kingdom	18,276	302	0.04	398

Top States for KIRK by Total
State	Total	Rank in State	Frequency %	Per million people
Texas	4,072	612	0.020	195
California	3,843	830	0.011	113
Ohio	3,186	359	0.028	281
Florida	2,701	738	0.017	169
Tennessee	2,252	379	0.040	396
Top States for KIRK by Frequency
State	Total	Rank in State	Frequency %	Per million people
West Virginia	1,292	164	0.071	714
Oklahoma	1,538	260	0.045	446
Tennessee	2,252	379	0.040	396
Kentucky	1,440	414	0.036	356
Mississippi	868	507	0.031	305

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

Classification and Origin of KIRK

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 KIRK 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 KIRK 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 KIRK in the USA

Classification	Total	Percent
Mixed Race	880	1.69
White (Hispanic)	750	1.44
Native American/Alaskan	677	1.3
Asian/Pacific	213	0.41
White (Caucasian)	44,117	84.75
Black/African American	5,424	10.42

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

Meaning of KIRK in historical publications

KIRK. KIRKE. The northern pronunciation of Church. Many jarishes in the northern counties liave this prefix, as Kirk-Heaton, Kirk-Newton, Kirk-Malew, Kirk-Linton, Kirk-Oswald, Kirk-Sandal, &c. There are probably several distinct families of this name.

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

(origin: Teut.) Kirche, a church. Gaelic, cearcall, a circle, the primitive places of worship among the Celts were round, a symbol of eternity, and the existence of the Supreme Being, without beginning or end.

Arthur, William (1857) An Etymological Dictionary of Family and Christian Names. New York: Sheldon, Blakeman. Public Domain.

Similar names to KIRK

The following names have similar spellings or pronunciations as KIRK.

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.