Nancy’s Baby Names began as a blog in March of 2006. Within a few years, it had grown to include a large directory featuring popularity graphs and data tables (e.g., Romeo, Juliet).
The thing that really sets this site apart, though, is the strong focus on history. My mission is to track down and document as many historically significant personal names as I can. This includes….
- names that saw higher usage in the U.S. thanks to historical events (Hildy, Halley, Belvin, Brenda, Korla, Klondike, Rockne, Rudolph, Aldrin, Arlynne),
- the names of individual people (Kenesaw Mountain, Legal Tender, Jesse Roper, Archibald Astor, Maitland Albert, George Fried, Zeppelina, Karina, Airlene, Orbit), and
- groups of name that, together, point to larger trends/events (French revolution, Russian revolution, Vietnamese immigration, Albanian immigration, Chinese New Year, colonial skirmishes, eclipses, the early days of radio).
Of course, the site also offers plenty of non-history stuff: name rankings, name quotes, sibling sets, etc.
So who’s been doing all this writing for all these years?
That would be me, Nancy Man. I’m a Harvard-educated, Colorado-based writer who has been fascinated by names since childhood. (The name that kicked things off for me was Flavilla.)
My name-writing has been cited by publications like New York Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, Woman’s Day, Redbook, Daily Mail, Mental Floss, HuffPo, Vice, and The Week. My favorite citation so far, though, would have to be the U.S. Census Bureau linking to my post about Emancipation Proclamation Coggeshall.
Thanks for checking out my About page. If you’d like to get in touch or support this site, just click those links.