I Have a Common Last Name

A long time ago, somewhere in Sweden, there was a man who was the son of another man named John. Let's say his name was Ivan. Perhaps there were several Ivans in his neighborhood. It became necessary to distinguish which Ivan he was. So he added some form of "Johnson" to his name and became Ivan Johnson, or some variant of that.

Whether it was really in Sweden or somewhere else, I've come to realize that by doing research on the origin of my last name won't get me very far. I only have to look in the local phone book to see how many "Johnsons" there are. I'm sure that my great-grandfather Ivan from Sweden probably changed his name somewhere between the time when he lived in Sweden and the time when he arrived at Ellis Island, in New York near the turn of the 20th century.

I've certainly found several variants myself: Johannsen, Johanssen, Johanson, and so on.

I'm not surprised that there are many other "Dan Johnson's" on the Internet.