How popular is the baby name Diana 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 Diana.

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Popularity of the baby name Diana


Posts that mention the name Diana

What popularized the baby name Tammy in the late 1950s?

The character Tammy Tyree from the movie "Tammy and the Bachelor" (1957).
Tammy Tyree from “Tammy and the Bachelor“

Last week, two women named Tammy won elections: Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin was elected to the U.S. Senate, and Tammy Duckworth of Illinois was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

Do you think this could be enough to revive the baby name Tammy?

The name started popping up in the U.S. baby name data in the 1930s. It was in the top 1,000 by the late 1940s, and was extremely popular by the late 1950s:

  • 1961: 15,527 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 28th]
  • 1960: 14,311 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 31st]
  • 1959: 13,707 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 31st]
  • 1958: 9,981 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 44th]
  • 1957: 4,361 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 107th]
  • 1956: 261 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 583rd]
  • 1955: 192 baby girls named Tammy [rank: 677th]

What caused the surge in popularity?

The romantic comedy Tammy and the Bachelor (1957), which featured a naïve country girl named Tammy Tyree (played by Debbie Reynolds).

Early in the movie, Tammy and her grandfather rescued a man named Peter Brent (played by Leslie Nielsen) from a plane crash. Here’s how Tammy breathlessly explained her name to Peter:

I’m Tammy, my baptized name is Tambrey (it means immortal), my full name is Tammy Tyree only folks call me Tammy.

Even more influential than the character, though, was the movie’s memorable theme song, “Tammy,” which was performed by Reynolds herself:

Reynolds’ version, as well as versions by other performers, reached #1 on Billboard’s Honor Roll Of Hits chart for seven weeks straight from August to October of 1957.

(The Honor Roll was a pre-Hot 100 chart that combined various recordings of each song into single list items, resulting in consolidated rankings.)

The film and the song popularized not just the name Tammy, but also a slew of other Tam-names, including Tambra, Tamela, Tamera, Tami, Tamie, Tammi, Tammie, Tamra, Tamara, and Tambrey — the character’s “baptized name.” :)

The name Tamre, which debuted in 1958, was the top debut name for baby girls that year.

The name Tammy stayed popular through the ’60s, thanks to two more Tammy films (1961 & 1963) and a short-lived TV series (1965-1966). It was one of the top ten baby girl names in the nation in 1964 and from 1966 to 1971. (Tammy Baldwin was born in 1962, and Tammy Duckworth in 1968.)

After that, Tammy began sinking. It dropped out of the top 100 in 1981, out of the top 1,000 in 1992, and continues to fall every year:

  • 2011: 58 baby girls named Tammy
  • 2010: 69 baby girls named Tammy
  • 2009: 96 baby girls named Tammy
  • 2008: 120 baby girls named Tammy

Do you think the national coverage of Tammy Baldwin and Tammy Duckworth in 2012 could reverse this trend? (Even if just for a year?)

P.S. The song “Tammy” was composed by the songwriters who created “Que Sera, Sera,” and it was popular at the same time as “Diana” by Paul Anka.

Sources: Tammy and the Bachelor (1957) – TCM, Tammy (song) – Wikipedia, SSA

Princess Diana’s niece named Charlotte Diana

Diana, Princess of Wales (1961-1997)
Diana, Princess of Wales

Speaking of English names…

Lady Di’s younger brother, Charles Spencer, welcomed a baby girl on July 30.

He and his wife decided to named the baby Charlotte Diana Spencer — middle name in honor of the late Princess of Wales.

Charles said:

[T]hough it’s been 15 years since Diana died, I still miss her every day and I wanted her commemorated in the naming of our daughter.

Source: Sykes, Tom. “Lady Di’s Brother Names New Baby in Her Honour.” Daily Beast 6 Aug. 2012.

Image: Adapted from Diana, Princess of Wales 1997 by John Mathew Smith under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Inventive baby names in Cuba

Havana, Cuba

Here are some of the inventive baby names that have been bestowed in Cuba over the last few decades:

  • Adianez (Zenaida backwards)
  • Ailed (Delia backwards)
  • Boris
  • Aledmys
  • Danyer (from the English word “danger“)
  • Dayesi
  • Dianisleysis (in honor of Princess Diana)
  • Disami
  • Geyne (combination of Geronimo and Nelly)
  • Hanoi (from the name of the capital of Vietnam)
  • Juliabe
  • Katia
  • Leydi (from the English word “lady”)
  • Maivi (from the English word “maybe”)
  • Mayren (combination of Mayra and Rene)
  • Migdisray (combination of Migdalia and Raymundo)
  • Milaidys (from the English phrase “my lady”)
  • Odlanier (Reinaldo backwards)
  • Olnavy (from “Old Navy”)
  • Orazal (Lazaro backwards)
  • Robelkis (combination of Roberto and Belkis)
  • Tatiana
  • Usarmy (from “U.S. Army”)
  • Usmail (from “U.S. Mail”)
  • Usnavi (from “U.S. Navy”)
  • Widayesi
  • Yadel
  • Yakarta (based on Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia)
  • Yamisel
  • Yander
  • Yaneymi (combination of Yanet and Mijail)
  • Yanisey
  • Yasnaya (possibly based on Yasnaya Polyana, the name of several locations in Russia)
  • Yirmara
  • Yoanni
  • Yoelkis
  • Yohendry
  • Yolaide
  • Yordanka
  • Yosbel
  • Yotuel (from the Spanish words yo, tu, el, meaning “I, you, he”)
  • Yovel
  • Yulieski
  • Yumara
  • Yumilsis
  • Yunier
  • Yuri
  • Yuset

Why all the Y-names? It has to do with the Soviet Union’s influence in Cuba, which made Russian-sounding names (often ones that start with Y) fashionable on the island for a number of years. In fact, Cubans born during the ’70s and ’80s have been referred to as Generación Y.

Lillian Guerra, a professor of Cuban history at the University of Florida, says that names like Usmail and Usarmy began popping up in the 1990s, when Cubans started coming into contact with American travelers and culture.

Aurora Camacho, a member of the Cuban Institute for Literature and Linguistics, notes that more traditional names like Maria and Pedro are still being used in Cuba, but “certainly with less frequency.”

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Oldtimers on Paseo de Marti, Havana, Cuba by kuhnmi under CC BY 2.0.

Two more people named for horses?

horse

In her autobiography, fashion editor Diana Vreeland mentioned two people named for horses:

[Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster] was named after a horse — Bendor, who won the Derby. Lots of people were named after horses. One of my great friends in London was Lady Morvyth Menson. I asked, “For goodness’ sakes, where’d you get this name Morvyth?” She said, “Well, you see, my father was off racing somewhere when I was born. My mother was dying, and there was no one in charge but the servants. ‘We’ve got to name this child something.'” So they called her Morvyth after one of the polo ponies. Terribly pretty Welsh name, isn’t it?

Do the stories check out?

The first is a false alarm. As a baby, Hugh Grosvenor (1879-1953) was nicknamed Bendor after the thoroughbred Bend Or, because both had “chestnut hair.” The horse, which won the Epsom Derby in 1880, was owned by Grosvenor’s grandfather.

The second seems suspicious. Lady Morvyth (1896-1959) wasn’t really one of Vreeland’s “great friends” — her married name was Benson, not Menson — but I have no way to check on the names of the ponies, so I guess I can’t discount it.

(“Morvyth” is a version of the Welsh name Morfudd, a “name borne by many women from early Welsh tradition.”)

I’m still intrigued by Vreeland’s claim that “[l]ots of people were named after horses,” but I wish she’d included more examples in the book.

Sources:

  • Grosvenor Estate – The 2nd Duke
  • MacKillop, James. A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
  • Vreeland, Diana, George Plimpton, Christopher Hemphill. D.V. New York: Ecco, 2011.

Image: Adapted from Dealer’s pic without lead rope by Cjambla under CC BY-SA 3.0.