Morton
From an English surname meaning "marsh town" or "moor town."
Name Census estimates that about 2,111 living Americans carry the first name Morton. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Morton today is around 76 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Morton births was 1923 (482 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Morton. 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.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Morton with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • The typical person named Morton is about 76 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Mortons were born before 1960.
People living today
2.1K
~ 1 in 162,366 Americans
Peak year
1923
482 babies that year
Average age
76
years old
2021 SSA rank
#5,358
Tracked since 1880
Census
Morton in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 3,123 people with the first name Morton, which placed it at #5,486 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
#5,486
National first-name rank
People counted
3.1K
3,123 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.0
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
90.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Morton
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Morton is White at 90.7%. The next largest groups are Black (4.9%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (1.6%). 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 Morton 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 Morton at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White90.7% · 2,832
- Black or African American4.9% · 152
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.6% · 50
- Two or more races1.3% · 41
- Hispanic or Latino1.2% · 36
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.4% · 12
Gender
Gender distribution for Morton
Out of the 12,341 babies given the name Morton since 1880, 100.0% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Morton as a male name
- Ranked #9,404 in 2021
- 8 male births in 2021
- Peak: 1923 (482 births)
Morton as a female name
- Ranked #5,358 in 1918
- 5 female births in 1918
- Peak: 1918 (5 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Morton appears almost entirely male. Of the 3,125 people counted with this name, 99.2% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Morton: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Morton 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 4,335 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
Morton 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 Morton during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Mortons live
The SSA's state-level files cover 25 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois recorded the most babies named Morton, while Wisconsin, North Carolina, Nebraska recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 366 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Morton
The name Morton has its origins in Old English, derived from the words "mor" meaning "moor" or "marsh" and "tun" meaning "farm" or "settlement". It was a common place name in England during the Anglo-Saxon period, referring to settlements located near marshlands or moorlands.
Morton can be traced back to the 11th century, with records showing its use as a surname in the Domesday Book of 1086. One of the earliest known bearers of the name was Morton de Mora, who lived in Staffordshire, England, in the late 11th century.
In the Middle Ages, Morton became a popular given name among the English nobility and gentry. It was often associated with landed families who owned estates or manors near marshlands or moors. The name held connotations of wealth, status, and landholding.
One notable historical figure with the name Morton was John Morton, who lived from 1420 to 1500. He was an English prelate who served as the Archbishop of Canterbury and played a significant role in the Wars of the Roses. Another prominent Morton was James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton, who lived from 1516 to 1581 and was a Scottish nobleman and regent of Scotland during the minority of King James VI.
In the literary realm, Morton Anderson, an American playwright and screenwriter, was born in 1901 and passed away in 1979. He is best known for his collaboration with George S. Kaufman on the play "What Price Glory?" and the screenplay for the 1942 film "The Talk of the Town".
Morton Feldman, a pioneering American composer of the 20th century, was born in 1926 and died in 1987. He was a significant figure in the development of experimental and avant-garde music, known for his works that explored the boundaries of sound and silence.
Another notable bearer of the name was Morton Sobell, an American electrical engineer who was born in 1917 and died in 2018. He was convicted of espionage in 1951 along with Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, although his involvement in the case remains controversial.
While the name Morton has its roots in Old English and was once closely associated with landed gentry, it has since been adopted more broadly across various cultures and demographics. Its meaning and associations have evolved over time, but it remains a name with a rich historical legacy.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Morton
People
Morton + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Morton as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with M
Other first names starting with M with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Morton: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Morton?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,111 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Morton 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 162,366 US residents.
Is Morton a common name?
We classify Morton as "Rare". It ranks above 93.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 12,341 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Morton most popular?
The single biggest year for Morton was 1923, when 482 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Morton is about 76 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Morton in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 3,123 people with the name Morton, or 1.03 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #5,486 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 Morton 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 Morton?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Morton appears almost entirely male. Of the 3,125 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 Morton?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Morton is White at 90.7%. The next largest groups are Black (4.9%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (1.6%). 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 Morton most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Morton in the 2020 Census, accounting for 90.7% (2,832 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 Morton in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Morton a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Morton 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 Morton still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Morton 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 Morton 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 common is the name Morton?
See how many Americans are named Morton on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.