Ready to take a look at history through the lens of names?
The Baby Name Timeline is a collection of thousands of historically popular/trendy U.S. baby names. Many of these names became trendy thanks to various types of pop culture: movies, music, television, sports, news stories, politics, comic strips, video games, and so forth.
I’m slowly converting the original decade-by-decade timeline into a more detailed year-by-year timeline, so I apologize if the table below is looking rather incomplete at the moment.
Here are links to each decade, and to the single years I’ve completed so far:
| 2020s: | 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 |
| 2010s | …2016, 2017… |
| 2000s | 2000, 2001, 2002…2006, 2007… |
| 1990s | 1990, 1991…1994, 1995…1999 |
| 1980s | …1984, 1985…1989 |
| 1970s | …1978, 1979 |
| 1960s: | 1960, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969 |
| 1950s: | 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959 |
| 1940s | …1943, 1944, 1945… |
| 1930s | 1930, 1931, 1932, 1933… |
| 1920s: | 1920, 1921, 1922, 1923, 1924, 1925, 1926, 1927, 1928, 1929 |
| 1910s: | 1910, 1911, 1912, 1913, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918, 1919 |
| 1900s: | 1900, 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904, 1905, 1906, 1907, 1908, 1909 |
| 1890s: | 1890, 1891, 1892, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1896, 1897, 1898, 1899 |
| 1880s: | 1880, 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884, 1885, 1886, 1887, 1888, 1889 |
All of the names on the timeline come from the U.S. Social Security Administration’s baby name data, which goes back to 1880.
I’ve also used other sources of data to research historically significant baby names that were used…
- in the U.S. prior to 1880, and
- outside the U.S. (all years).
[Latest update: May 2025]