My aunt married Herman Rosenbaum and they had two sons, both of whom changed their last name to Sanford. Of course, I knew that their last names were different because I had frequent contact with my aunt, uncle, and one of their sons while growing up, although their sons were almost a whole generation older than me. I don't know why it never occurred to me to question the last name difference before.
In the past few days (many thanks to generous RAWKers), I discovered that Herman had two brothers who had also both changed their last name to Sanford. For both, I have narrowed the date of the name change to between 1910 (when they were 12 and 8 years old) to 1940 (when they were married and in different households).
Now that my consciousness has been raised, I'd love to know why my 2 cousins (but not their father) and 2 of their uncles all made this same change, the reason for their selection of Sanford as their new last name, as well as when they did it. Is there any way to find records of name changes?
