When the researcher is confronted with looking for a needle in a haystack, he or she will gladly try out a tool that will reduce the size of the stack. This work is such a tool. Published originally by the American Council of Learned Societies, it lists and classifies thousands of surnames according to the several states in which they were found in 1790, thus enabling researchers to narrow their search to a particular area. English, Scottish, Celtic Irish, Ulster Irish, German, Dutch, French, and Swedish names predominate.