Mears
A surname that likely began as a place-name or boundary-name for someone living by a mere, or pond.
The #3,569 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 30,912 Americans shares it.
Etymology
The name is usually explained as a variant of Mear, Meer, or Mere, from Old English and Middle English words for a mere, meaning a pond, lake, or standing pool of water. In that reading, Mears would mean someone who lived by a mere or came from a place so called. Some old surname writers also treated it as a patronymic form with an added -s, but the place-name explanation is the more common one in the historical sources here.
History
Historical dictionaries place Mears alongside forms such as Mear, Meares, and Mieres, and connect it with local surnames formed from topographic features. The name appears in English records and later English and Irish surname listings, where spellings varied freely. Because the surname is short and phonetically simple, several related spellings developed in parallel.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Older surname writers often grouped Mears with other names ending in -s, since that ending could mark either a place-origin surname or a family relationship.
From the historical record
“MEARES, MEARS tpl., orgenit., of Mear, q.v, MEEARSi Mearns 19 Mellor”
— Surnames of the United Kingdom: a concise etymological dictionary (2 vols in 1)