How popular is the baby name Barbra in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Barbra.

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Popularity of the baby name Barbra


Posts that mention the name Barbra

Where did the baby name Siedah come from in the 1980s?

American singer/songwriter Siedah Garrett
Siedah Garrett

The name Siedah was in the U.S. baby name data for a 10-year stretch, from 1984 to 1993, and saw peak usage in 1988:

  • 1989: 47 baby girls named Siedah
  • 1988: 70 baby girls named Siedah [peak]
  • 1987: 14 baby girls named Siedah
  • 1986: 10 baby girls named Siedah
  • 1985: 19 baby girls named Siedah
  • 1984: 7 baby girls named Siedah [debut]
  • unlisted

Where did it come from? And what caused that spike?

The influence was singer/songwriter Siedah (pronounced sie-ee-dah) Garrett, a protégé of hitmaker Quincy Jones.

She wrote/co-wrote hundreds of songs — including, most famously, Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” — and sang background vocals for a number of other artists (such as Madonna, Chaka Khan, Donna Summer, Wang Chung, Barbra Streisand, Peter Cetera, and Tamia).

Expectant parents wouldn’t have been aware of Siedah’s behind-the-scenes work, but they certainly would have been influenced by the hit songs that Siedah was featured on.

For instance, the name’s debut was likely due to Siedah’s 1984 duet “Don’t Look Any Further” [vid] with Dennis Edwards (formerly of The Temptations). The song reached #72 on Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart in May.

And peak usage was no doubt fueled by an even bigger duet — this one with Michael Jackson himself. Their 1987 song “I Just Can’t Stop Loving You,” the lead single from the album Bad, reached #1 on the Hot 100 in September.

Siedah’s solo work may have also contributed to the name’s peak usage. Her own songs didn’t tend to perform well on the charts, but her most successful single, “K.I.S.S.I.N.G.” (1988), did manage to reach #97 on the Hot 100.

Siedah Garrett was born in Los Angeles in 1960 as Deborah Christine Garrett. She wasn’t a fan of her birth name:

It’s a pretty name but nobody called me Deborah. It was always abbreviated to Deb, Debbie, or DeeDee. I hated it.

At the age of thirteen, she adopted the name Siedah, which she defined as “shining and star-like.” (So far, I haven’t been able to verify this. The closest name I can find is the Arabic Sa’ida, which is the feminine form of Sa’id, meaning “happy, lucky.”)

What are your thoughts on the name Siedah?

Sources:

Image: Screenshot of Siedah Garrett from the music video for “K.I.S.S.I.N.G.”

How did “Yentl” influence baby names in 1984?

The characters Avigdor and Yentl from the movie "Yentl" (1983).
Avigdor and Yentl from “Yentl

The Jewish names Yentl and Avigdor both debuted in the U.S. baby name data in 1984:

Girls named YentlBoys named Avigdor
198611.
1985136
198412*5*
1983..
1982..
*Debut

Why?

Because both were featured in the 1983 musical film Yentl, which starred Barbra Streisand and Mandy Patinkin as students (Yentl and Avigdor) at a Jewish religious school in Poland in the early 1900s. Only males could attend the school, so Yentl had to dress and live as a young man, “Anshel,” in order to receive an education.

The film was based on a 1975 play which was, in turn, based on the short story “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy” (1963) by Isaac Bashevis Singer.

What do these names mean?

Yentl is a diminutive of Yente, which comes from the Yentille, the Yiddish version of the French name Gentille, meaning “noble, aristocratic.”

Avigdor is a Hebrew name derived from the expression avi Gedor, meaning “Gedor’s father.” The name Gedor means “wall.” (Avigdor was one of the by-names of Moses in the Talmud, the central text of Rabbinic Judaism.)

And Anshel, the name Yentl used while disguised as a male, is the Yiddish form of Anselm, a Germanic name made up of elements meaning “god” and “helmet, protection.”

What are your thoughts on these names?

Sources: Yentl (film) – Wikipedia, Behind the Name, The Name Avigdor | BH Open Databases,

Where did the baby name Lainie come from in 1966?

Lainie Kazan's self-titled debut album (1966)
Lainie Kazan album

The baby name name Lainie first popped up in the U.S. baby name data in the mid-1960s:

  • 1971: 48 baby girls named Lainie
  • 1970: 91 baby girls named Lainie [peak]
  • 1969: 73 baby girls named Lainie
  • 1968: 68 baby girls named Lainie
  • 1967: 39 baby girls named Lainie
  • 1966: 21 baby girls named Lainie [debut]
  • 1965: unlisted

Where did this one come from?

Brooklyn-born singer Lainie Kazan (birth name Lanie Levine).

She’d had a career on Broadway since 1961 — she was Barbra Streisand’s Funny Girl understudy, notably — but things changed around 1966, the year she put out her first two albums and started making regular TV appearances on Dean Martin’s variety show (plus occasional appearances on similar shows, like The Merv Griffin Show and The Ed Sullivan Show).

One of her singles, “Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye,” peaked at #29 on Billboard‘s Adult Contemporary chart in February of 1967.

She continued putting out albums and appearing in movies and on television, but modern audiences would probably know Lainie from either Beaches or My Big Fat Greek Wedding — in both films she played a mother. In fact, mother characters became her specialty:

The way Johnny Depp plays off-kilter fantasy-world anti-heroes, the way Gilbert Gottfried plays parrots and ducks, Lainie Kazan has almost cornered the market on Jewish mother roles.

What are your thoughts on the name Lainie?

Sources: Lainie Kazan – Wikipedia, Happy Jewish Mother’s Day – Oy!Chicago

What gave the baby name Vicki a boost in the late 1930s?

Vicki Lester's name in lights (outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre) in the movie "A Star is Born" (1937).
Vicki Lester’s name in lights

In April of 1937, the film A Star Is Born was released. It starred Janet Gaynor and Fredric March as a married couple at opposite ends of their Hollywood careers: hers beginning, his ending.

The husband was named Norman Maine. The wife, on the other hand, had several identities. At first she was North Dakota farm girl Esther Victoria Blodgett. Then she morphed into movie star Vicki Lester for most of the film. Finally, in that memorable last line, she said: “Hello everybody. This is Mrs. Norman Maine.”

So how did she go from Esther Blodgett to “Vicki Lester”? Here’s the scene:

Press Agent: Do you know what her name is? Esther Victoria Blodgett.
Producer: Gee, we’ll have to do something about that right away.
Press Agent: …Esther Victoria Blodgett
Producer: Well that Blodgett’s definitely out. See, uh…Esther Victoria, Victoria, Vicki…how about Vicki?
Producer’s Secretary: Oh I think that’s terribly cute.
Producer: Let’s see, Vicki…Vicki what?
Press Agent: Vicki Vicki, pronounced Vicki Vicki. [sarcasm]
Producer: Siesta, Besta, Sesta, Desta, Fester…
Press Agent: Oh that’s very pretty.
Producer: …Jester, Hester, Jester, Lester…Vicki Lester!
Secretary: Oh I like that!

Everyone in the office started chanting the newly minted name Vicki Lester…and with that the star was born.

On the name charts, the entire name-group — Vicki, Vickie, Vicky, Vickey, and so forth — rode a wave of trendiness that started in the ’30s, peaked around 1957, and was over by the ’80s. It’s hard to say how much of this trendiness (if any of it) was fueled by the movie, but one thing definitely attributable to the movie is the higher-than-expected usage of “Vicki” in the late ’30s:

  • 1941: 542 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 274th]
  • 1940: 405 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 316th]
  • 1939: 334 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 355th]
  • 1938: 367 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 332nd]
  • 1937: 148 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 555th]
  • 1936: 82 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 738th]
  • 1935: 70 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 822nd]

Notice how the number adjusted downward in 1939 before the name was picked back up by the wave.

Perhaps even more interesting is the fact that several baby girls born in the late ’30s were named “Vicki Lester.” In 1940, for instance, the Seil family of Washington included parents Orval (26 years old) and Beryl (25) and daughters Arlene (4) and Vicki Lester (1).

vicki lester, census, 1940
Vicki Lester Seil on 1940 U.S. Census

History repeated itself in 1954 upon the release of the first A Star is Born remake, which starred Judy Garland as Esther/Vicki. The name Vicki was again nudged upward a few years ahead of schedule:

  • 1958: 7,434 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 57th]
  • 1957: 8,101 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 51st]
  • 1956: 7,762 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 57th]
  • 1955: 7,978 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 52nd]
  • 1954: 8,220 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 50th]
  • 1953: 6,822 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 61st]
  • 1952: 6,774 baby girls named Vicki [ranked 61st]

And, again, records from the mid-1950s reveal a handful of baby girls named “Vicki Lester.”

In the second remake — the 1976 Barbra Streisand version — the character was called Esther throughout the film. Even if there hadn’t been a name change, though, the popularity of Vicki was plummeting by the ’70s and I doubt the film could have done much to boost its image/usage.

Currently the name Vicki is only given to about a dozen baby girls in the U.S. per year. But another version of A Star is Born is in the works — a Lady Gaga version slated for 2018. If this third remake materializes, and if it features the name Vicki, do you think it will influence the baby name charts?

(While we wait for 2018, check out the original version of A Star is Born (1937), which is in the public domain.)

Sources: SSA, U.S. Census
Image: Screenshot of A Star Is Born