How popular is the baby name Germaine 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 Germaine.
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Which boy names decreased the most in popularity from 2017 to 2018?
In this post we’ll answer the question two different ways: first by looking at the top absolute (raw number) drops, second by looking at the top relative drops.
Fastest Falling Boy Names: Absolute
Matthew, -1,747 baby boys
Logan, -1,662
Jacob, -1,408
Aiden, -1,324
Aaron, -1,243
Mason, -1,114
Christopher, -1,024
Michael, -1,019
Andrew, -1,017
Jayden, -981
Fastest Falling Boy Names: Relative
Neizan, -78% (from 27 to 6 baby boys)
Oseias, -74%
Thierno, -74%
Beren, -73%
Franko, -72%
Borna, -71%
Germaine, -71%
Jamien, -71%
Jevin, -71%
Fedor, -69%
(This second list only accounts for names that stayed in the data; I didn’t account for names that fell off the list in 2018.)
If you have any explanations for the name movement above, let us know in the comments!
P.S. Here’s the SSA’s table of baby names that decreased in rank from 2017 to 2018. The top boy names on their list are Aaden, Dilan, and Craig.
“Everly” is hot…”Beverly” is not. It’s a one-letter difference between fashionable and fusty.
If you’re sensitive to style, you’ll prefer Everly. It fits with today’s trends far better than Beverly does.
But if you’re someone who isn’t concerned about style, or prefers to go against style, then you may not automatically go for Everly. In fact, you may be more attracted to Beverly because it’s the choice that most modern parents would avoid.
If you’ve ever thought about intentionally giving your baby a dated name (like Debbie, Grover, Marcia, or Vernon) for the sake of uniqueness within his/her peer group — if you have no problem sacrificing style for distinctiveness — then this list is for you.
Years ago, the concept of “contrarian” baby names came up in the comments of a post about Lois. Ever since then, creating a collection of uncool/contrarian baby names has been on my to-do list.
Finally, last month, I experimented with various formulas for pulling unstylish baby names out of the SSA dataset. Keeping the great-grandparent rule in mind, I aimed for names that would have been fashionable among the grandparents of today’s babies. The names below are the best results I got.
Interestingly, thirteen of the names above — Bobbie, Cary, Dale, Jackie, Jimmie, Jody, Kerry, Kim, Lynn, Robin, Sandy, Tracey, Tracy — managed to make both lists.
Now some questions for you…
Do you like any of these names? Would you be willing to use any of them on a modern-day baby? Why or why not?
So my question is this: Could Essfa, a one-hit wonder from 1921, be another flaw?
According to the SSA data, the name Essfa was given to 6 babies in 1921, and all 6 of these babies were born in Vermont.
But when we look for these Essfas in the Social Security Death Index (SSDI), we get…nothing. Not a single Essfa from anywhere, born in any year.
This doesn’t prove anything, but it is very curious.
Then there’s the fact that all these Essfas were born in Vermont, a relatively small state not known for adventurous baby-naming. The SSA’s Vermont-specific data from 1921 puts oddball Essfa on par with classics like Emma and Julia:
All baby names given to 6 babies in Vermont in 1921, according to SSA
After doing more research, I was only able to find a single person named Essfa who was born in Vermont in 1921. The intriguing part? She had multiple identities:
She was born Essfa Estella Bickford Vermont on May 7, 1921.
She became Essfa E. Davis upon marrying William Earl Davis in Vermont in 1937.
She became Essfa E. Millette upon marrying Rupert Frank Millette in New Hampshire in 1941.
She became Essfa E. Walker upon marrying Howard C. Walker in New Hampshire in 1953.
She became Essfa E. Davis (again) upon marrying Arthur I. Davis in Connecticut in 1964, and passed away in 1976 as a Davis.
And I found a sixth alias — in Billboard magazine, oddly enough. For decades Billboard operated a mail-forwarding service for traveling performers. The name “Essfa E. White” appeared regularly on their Letter List from 1945 until 1948. (She was also listed under the surname Millette once, in 1946.)
So we know for sure that one Essfa was born in Vermont in 1921, and that this Essfa used at least six different names (if you count Davis twice) throughout her lifetime.
At this point, I can’t help but wonder whether this particular Essfa was counted 6 different times in the SSA data somehow.
The curious name Capucine first appeared in the U.S. baby name data in the early 1960s:
1964: 8 baby girls named Capucine
1962: 8 baby girls named Capucine
1961: 5 baby girls named Capucine [debut]
1960: unlisted
1959: unlisted
Where did it come from?
French actress/model Capucine (pronounced kah-pu-seen, roughly).
Her first English-language film, Song Without End, was released in mid-1960. The film was about 19th-century Hungarian composer Franz Liszt, and Capucine played a fictionalized version of Polish princess Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, who was romantically linked to Liszt. The role earned her a Golden Globe nomination.
The film’s trailer introduced Capucine to American audiences by emphasizing the uniqueness of her name:
Capucine — a name to whisper, a name to shout, a name to remember.
Capucine — one of France’s great beauties.
Capucine’s birth name was Germaine Hélène Irène Lefebvre. When she started to model professionally as a teenager, she was given the name Capucine — the French word for the nasturtium flower (which is shaped like the hood of a Capuchin monk’s robe). According to Capucine’s Song Without End co-star Dirk Bogarde, “[s]he couldn’t remember who pinned it on her — Chanel, Givenchy or just a publicist somewhere.”
At the end of the ’60s, Capucine appeared alongside fellow model Donyale Luna in the film Fellini Satyricon.
What are your thoughts on the baby name Capucine?
Sources:
Bogarde, Dirk. Cleared for Take-Off: A Memoir. London: Bloomsbury, 2012.
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