About Names: Dr. Cleveland Evans on the name “Dexter”

“Dexter: Original Sin,” a prequel to Showtime’s hit series “Dexter” (2006-2013), about a serial killer who murders other murderers, premiered on Paramount+ with Showtime on Dec. 13. Patrick Gibson stars as young Dexter Morgan, with Michael C. Hall, star of “Dexter,” providing his “inner voice.”

Dexter is an English surname from Old English “deagestre.” This originally meant a woman who dyed cloth, but by 1200 was used for both men and women dyers.

By pure coincidence, “dexter” is also Latin for “right-handed” or “skillful.” Occasionally parents who knew Latin may have chosen Dexter because of that.

However, it’s clear the surname was the main source. Britain’s 1851 census included only 22 men with Dexter as a first name, while 1850’s United States census had 1,903, when total populations were about equal. Of those American Dexters, 564 were born in Massachusetts, 637 in the rest of New England, and 387 in New York, whose upstate was mostly settled by New Englanders.

Samuel Dexter (1761-1816) served as a representative and senator from Massachusetts before being named Secretary of War in 1800 and Secretary of the Treasury in 1801. Several of his relatives were prominent in Massachusetts or New York.

Timothy Dexter (1747-1806) of Newburyport, Massachusetts, was an uneducated man who married a rich widow and became extremely wealthy when Revolutionary War currency he bought when most thought it completely worthless was unexpectedly redeemed by the government at 1% of its face value. He faked his own death to see who’d show up to his funeral. His 1802 book “A Pickle for the Knowing Ones,” touting his unlikely success, was a bestseller despite having almost no punctuation. In the second edition, he included two pages printed with only punctuation marks, telling readers to insert them wherever they wanted.

The politician and the rich eccentric together made Dexter a well-used first name in New England. In 1880, when Social Security’s name lists start, Dexter ranked 809th.