Dewitt
A variant of the Dutch surname De Wit, meaning "the white" or "the fair one".
Name Census estimates that about 2,482 living Americans carry the first name Dewitt. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Dewitt today is around 63 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Dewitt births was 1921 (161 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Dewitt. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
2.5K
~ 1 in 138,096 Americans
Peak year
1921
161 babies that year
Average age
63
years old
2023 SSA rank
#9,987
Tracked since 1880
Census
Dewitt in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,127 people with the first name Dewitt, which placed it at #7,237 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#7,237
National first-name rank
People counted
2.1K
2,127 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
52.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Dewitt
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Dewitt is White at 52.8%. The next largest groups are Black (42.3%) and Two or More Races (2.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Dewitt described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Dewitt at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White52.8% · 1,122
- Black or African American42.3% · 900
- Two or more races2.4% · 50
- Hispanic or Latino1.6% · 35
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.6% · 13
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 7
Popularity
Dewitt: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Dewitt from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 1,402 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1920s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Dewitt by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Dewitt during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Dewitts live
The SSA's state-level files cover 23 states and territories. Mississippi, North Carolina, Georgia recorded the most babies named Dewitt, while Nebraska, Maryland, Iowa recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 138 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Dewitt
The name Dewitt originated from the Dutch language and culture. It is a combination of the Dutch words "de" meaning "the" and "witt" meaning "white" or "bright". This name likely emerged during the Middle Ages, around the 12th to 15th centuries, when Dutch was developing as a distinct language.
The earliest recorded instances of the name Dewitt can be traced back to the Netherlands and parts of modern-day Belgium, where Dutch was spoken. It was initially used as a descriptive name, perhaps referring to someone with fair hair or a bright complexion.
One of the earliest known references to the name Dewitt comes from the Dutch scholar and philosopher Desiderius Erasmus, who mentioned a person named Dewitt in his writings from the early 16th century.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Dewitt. One of the most famous was Cornelis de Witt (1623-1672), a Dutch statesman and political leader who served as Grand Pensionary of Holland during the Dutch Golden Age.
Another prominent figure was Jacobus de Witt (1589-1629), a Dutch mathematician and astronomer who made significant contributions to the development of calculus and the study of celestial mechanics.
In the realm of art, Dewitt Clinton Boutelle (1820-1884) was an American painter known for his landscape and genre paintings depicting scenes from everyday life in the United States.
John Dewitt (1789-1873) was an American lawyer and politician who served as a United States Senator from New York in the mid-19th century.
Lastly, Dewitt Bodeen (1908-1988) was an American writer and screenwriter, best known for his works of science fiction and horror, including the novel "The Compound Eye."
These are just a few examples of notable individuals throughout history who have carried the name Dewitt, which has its roots in the Dutch language and culture, reflecting its meaning of "the bright" or "the white."
People
Dewitt + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Dewitt as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with D
Other first names starting with D with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Dewitt: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Dewitt?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,482 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Dewitt going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 138,096 US residents.
Is Dewitt a common name?
We classify Dewitt as "Rare". It ranks above 94.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 7,210 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Dewitt most popular?
The single biggest year for Dewitt was 1921, when 161 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Dewitt is about 63 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Dewitt in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,127 people with the name Dewitt, or 0.70 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #7,237 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Dewitt in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Dewitt?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Dewitt appears almost entirely male. Of the 2,132 people counted with this name, 99.2% were male and only a very small share were female. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Dewitt?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Dewitt is White at 52.8%. The next largest groups are Black (42.3%) and Two or More Races (2.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Dewitt most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Dewitt in the 2020 Census, accounting for 52.8% (1,122 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Dewitt in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Dewitt a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Dewitt in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Dewitt still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Dewitt in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Dewitt can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have Dewitt as a first name?
If you just want to know how many Americans are named Dewitt, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.