I heard a story about friends of my great-grandparents whose original name was Chorny, which means "black" in Russian. Once in the United States, they decided to change their name to a an American name, so they changed their name to Schwartz. Their idea of a real American was a German Jew.

There you go!

I know someone whose grandfather was a Sephardi Jew who moved to England. His last name was D'oro and he thought it sounded too Jewish, so he changed it to Goldman.

My comment is probably non-sequitor, but the above posters made me laugh. I have a Brazilian friend who sends me Jewish jokes in Portuguese (I had one year of college Portuguese and am native-like in SPanish, so I understand). And the jokes, though in Portuguese, are just like ones my New York relatives would tell at family gatherings.

I can echo Bill Poser's story; despite carrying the last name "Busch", I don't have a drop of German blood in me. My Russian great-grandfather had exactly the same idea about passing for German when he got here. The original family name was "Beshunsky" (or something close; I'm not sure about the spelling).