Sandström
A Swedish surname meaning “sand stream” or “sand river,” originally tied to a place name or landscape feature.
The #7,627 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 70,943 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Sandström is a Swedish ornamental and locational-style surname built from sand, meaning “sand,” and ström, meaning “stream,” “current,” or “river.” The literal sense is “sand stream” or “sand river,” most likely referring to a sandy watercourse, shoreline, or place near such a feature. In Swedish naming practice, such compounds were often adopted as surnames from the 18th and 19th centuries onward.
History
The name is common in Sweden and among Swedish-descended families abroad. Many Swedish surnames of this type were either taken from nature imagery or formed from place-related elements when fixed surnames became more common. The spelling without the umlaut, Sandstrom, is the usual anglicized form in English-speaking countries.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
In Swedish, the letter ö in Sandström is pronounced roughly like the “u” in “fur,” which is why the name is often simplified to Sandstrom in English contexts.