Popular baby names in Austria, 2019

Flag of Austria
Flag of Austria

According to Statistics Austria, the most popular baby names in the country in 2019 were Emma and Maximilian.

Here are Austria’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2019:

Girl Names

  1. Emma, 766 baby girls
  2. Anna, 761
  3. Emilia, 694
  4. Marie, 662
  5. Mia, 635
  6. Lena, 610
  7. Laura, 605
  8. Johanna, 533
  9. Lea, 530
  10. Valentina, 519

Boy Names

  1. Maximilian, 841 baby boys
  2. Paul, 802
  3. Jakob, 799
  4. David, 772
  5. Felix, 732
  6. Elias, 728
  7. Lukas, 712
  8. Jonas, 673
  9. Alexander, 663
  10. Leon, 655

In the girls’ top 10, Lea replaced Sophia.

In the boys’ top 10, Jonas replaced Tobias.

In 2018, the top two names were Anna and Paul.

Sources: First Names of newborn babies 2019, Emma und Maximilian waren 2019 die beliebtesten Babynamen

Image: Adapted from Flag of Austria (public domain)

Free Domino’s Pizza for a baby named Dominic

pizza and baby

If you live in Australia and are expecting a baby any day now — and you really, really like Domino’s pizza — then here’s a contest for you!

Domino’s will be giving over ten thousand dollars’ worth of free pizza — the equivalent of a $14 pizza every month for 60 years — to one Australian family that welcomes a newborn baby on Wednesday, December 9th, and names that baby either Dominic or Dominique.

Why? It’s to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the company, which was founded in Michigan in 1960 (though it’s only been in Australia for 37 of those 60 years).

So: if you live in Australia, welcome a baby on Dec. 9, and name that baby either Dominic or Dominique, send Domino’s an email at “dombaby (at) dominos.com.au” and be ready to produce a certified copy of the baby’s birth certificate. Good luck!

Source: Domino’s will give you 60 YEARS worth of pizza if you name your child Dominic or Dominique

P.S. This isn’t the first time Domino’s has used a baby name contest for marketing purposes. Earlier contests have featured the names Brooklyn and Dorothy, for instance.

Update, Dec. 22: The winner, a baby boy named Dominic Julian Lot, was born in Sydney to parents Clementine Oldfield and Anthony Lot. (9Now)

Baby name story: Nira

Nyra Monsour in TV Guide (Jan. 1959)
Nyra Monsour

Actress Nyra Monsour, who was primarily active during the latter half of the 1950s, and who made “a specialty of playing exotic beauties on TV,” wasn’t really a Nyra — she was a Nira.

She was born to Syrian parents in California in January of 1934.

Her father, an unemployed movie-studio carpenter in Santa Monica when she was born, named her Nira Rose Monsour out of respect for the government checks that paid the hospital bills.

She was one of the many babies named after the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA). Because of her name, her family was invited to Washington to meet the president. (They didn’t end up going, though.)

Columbia Pictures altered the spelling of her name prior to her first move, The Saracen Blade (1954). The studio “felt that Nyra looked better” than the original spelling, the actress said.

Source: “Named for an Act of Congress.” TV Guide 31 Jan.-6 Feb. 1959: 20-22.

Baby born aboard steamship Georgic, named George

SS Georgic
SS Georgic

In 1933, during the second week of May, the ocean liner Georgic traveled west across the Atlantic from Ireland to the United States.

One day into the trip, a pregnant passenger named Alice Nolan welcomed a son — the first baby ever born aboard the Georgic (which had been launched earlier in the 1930s).

The baby’s name? George, in honor of the ship.

Sources:

  • “Baby, Born at Sea, Georgic Attraction.” Boston Globe 15 May 1933: 2.
  • “Baby Born on Liner Georgic.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch 15 May 1933: 9.