The German surname Fuhrman, also found in Austria and Switzerland, is a topographic name for someone who lived near a ferry or ford, from Middle High German term  vuore ‘load’, ‘place where one drives’ (related to English fare), or a habitational name from one of the many places named with this word. The surname is first recorded in Austria in the 14th Century when Pertholdt der Feurer is recorded in the Sonnenbug monastery in 1350. In the United States immigration records record the first bearer of the name or a variant as Johann Lehnhart Fuhr  as arriving in Pennsylvania in 1742.