Family name origins & meanings
- German : habitational name for someone from the village of Rockenfeld near Neuwied, Rhineland, named in Middle High German with rocke ‘rye’ (Old High German rocko) + feld ‘open country’.
- The first immigrants to bring this name to America arrived in America in 1734. Their descendant, the millionaire industrialist John D. Rockefeller (1839–1937), founder of Standard Oil, was born in Richford, NY; his father was a commodities dealer and farm owner.