Top baby names in China, 2020

Flag of China
Flag of China

The most popular baby names in China in 2020 were Yinuo and Yichen, according to an annual report on household registration information.

More than 24,000 baby girls were named Yinuo, defined by my source as “one promise.” (This may be an allusion to the Chinese idiom “a promise [is worth] a thousand pieces of gold.”)

More than 14,000 baby boys were named Yichen, defined as “great times” or “stars.”

The report also found that a growing number of Chinese parents “are giving their babies longer names to make their names stand out.”

Currently, about 3.3 percent of the population has names with four or more characters, while more than 90 percent of the names only have three characters, with their surnames included.

Sources: Report reveals most popular names of Chinese newborns in 2020, Ji Bu – Wikipedia

Image: Adapted from Flag of the People’s Republic of China (public domain)

What gave the baby name Adlai a boost in the 1950s?

Politician Adlai E. Stevenson II (1900-1965)
Adlai E. Stevenson II

According to the U.S. baby name data, the name Adlai saw peak usage in 1952, then a smaller spike four years later:

  • 1959: unlisted
  • 1958: unlisted
  • 1957: 6 baby boys named Adlai
  • 1956: 22 baby boys named Adlai
  • 1955: 12 baby boys named Adlai
  • 1954: 7 baby boys named Adlai
  • 1953: 18 baby boys named Adlai
  • 1952: 39 baby boys named Adlai [peak]
    • 6 born in Illinois
  • 1951: unlisted
  • 1950: unlisted

Why?

Because of politician Adlai Ewing Stevenson II — the namesake of politician Adlai Ewing Stevenson I, his grandfather.

Adlai Stevenson II served as the governor of Illinois from 1949 to 1953. He was elected “by a larger majority than any other candidate had received in the history of the state.”

On a national level, though, he’s better remembered for being the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for the presidency in both 1952 and 1956.

In spite of his refusal to seek the presidential nomination in 1952, he was drafted by the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. He waged a vigorous campaign, but the popular appeal of wartime hero Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower proved irresistible. Stevenson was defeated a second time four years later, again by Eisenhower.

One of the other candidates for the Democratic nomination in both ’52 and ’56 was W. Averell Harriman.

Sources: SSA, Adlai Stevenson II – Wikipedia, Adlai E. Stevenson | American Statesman | Britannica

Popular baby names in France, 2020

Flag of France
Flag of France

According to France’s National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), the most popular baby names in the country in 2020 were Jade (pronounced zhahd) and Léo.

Here are France’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2020:

Girl Names

  1. Jade, 3,814 baby girls
  2. Louise, 3,811
  3. Emma, 3,478
  4. Alice, 2,987
  5. Ambre, 2,746
  6. Lina, 2,731
  7. Rose, 2,664
  8. Chloé, 2,574
  9. Mia, 2,458
  10. Léa, 2,429

Boy Names

  1. Léo, 4,496 baby boys
  2. Gabriel, 4,415
  3. Raphaël, 3,970
  4. Arthur, 3,800
  5. Louis, 3,795
  6. Jules, 3,551
  7. Adam, 3,386
  8. Maël, 3,292
  9. Lucas, 3,245
  10. Hugo, 3,129

In the girls’ top 10, Mia replaced Mila.

The boys’ top 10 includes the same 10 names, but in a different order.

In 2019, the top two names in France were Emma and Gabriel.

Source: Classement des prénoms en France depuis 1900 – Insee

Image: Adapted from Flag of France (public domain)

Where did the baby name Adlai come from in the 1890s?

Politician Adlai E. Stevenson I (1835-1914)
Adlai E. Stevenson I

The interesting name Adlai first appeared in the U.S. baby named data in the early 1890s:

  • 1893: 9 baby boys named Adlai (rank: 706th)
  • 1892: 17 baby boys named Adlai (rank: 480th)
  • 1891: 6 baby boys named Adlai (rank: 841st) [debut]
  • 1890: unlisted
  • 1889: unlisted

That 1892 spike in usage remained Adlai’s high-point until the 1950s.

But, because many people born before 1937 never applied for a Social Security card, the earliest decades of the SSA data tend to under-count actual usage. The following numbers, from the Social Security Death Index, should be more accurate:

  • 1893: 34 people named Adlai
  • 1892: 91 people named Adlai
  • 1891: 8 people named Adlai
  • 1890: 3 people named Adlai
  • 1889: 1 person named Adlai

So, what inspired this sudden interest in the name Adlai?

Adlai Ewing Stevenson, who served as the 23rd Vice President from 1893 to 1897 under President Grover Cleveland. (They were called “Cleve and Steve” during the campaign, adorably.)

He’d served as assistant postmaster general during Cleveland’s first term, and, before that, he’d served twice as a U.S. Representative from Illinois (1875-77; 1879-81).

The slightly elevated usage of “Adlai” in 1891 — a year before the campaign/election — could be due to the fact that many babies were not named at birth during that era. So, some 1891 babies likely weren’t given names until well into 1892.

Going through the records, I found dozens of people with the first-middle name combo “Adlai Stevenson.” Here are a few examples from 1892 specifically:

(The handful of older “Adlai Stevensons” I found were all born in Illinois in the 1870s and 1880s.)

Other folks got different versions of the name, such as Stevenson Adlai and Adlai Ewing.

Even better, I found a bunch of people named after the “Cleve and Steve” Democratic ticket, such as Adlai Cleveland, Adlai Grover, Cleveland Adlai, Cleveland Stevenson, Grover Adlai, and Grover Stevenson.

The name Adlai comes from the Bible, but no one knows for sure what it means. Guesses include “my witness; my ornament” (Hitchcock’s Bible Names Dictionary, 1869) and “lax, weary” (International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 1939).

What are your thoughts on the name Adlai? Would you use it?

Sources: SSA, SSDI, Adlai Stevenson I – Wikipedia, Adlai Stevenson – Britannica