How popular is the baby name Dondi 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 Dondi.

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Popularity of the baby name Dondi


Posts that mention the name Dondi

Where did the baby name Shilo come from in 1970?

Neil Diamond's album "Velvet Gloves and Spit" (1970 reissue)
Neil Diamond album

Long before celebs Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt popularized the name Shiloh, singer Neil Diamond put the name Shilo (no H) on the onomastic map:

  • 1972: 35 baby girls and 19 baby boys named Shilo
  • 1971: 32 baby girls and 11 baby boys named Shilo
  • 1970: 38 baby girls and 9 baby boys named Shilo [dual-gender debut]
  • 1969: unlisted
  • 1968: unlisted

Diamond’s song “Shilo” was originally and released on the 1967 album Just for You, but his label wouldn’t release it as a single, because they didn’t think an introspective song about an imaginary childhood friend (“Shilo, when I was young / I used to call your name / When no one else would come / Shilo, you always came”) would be a commercial success.

Diamond switched labels in 1968. By 1970, several of his new songs (“Sweet Caroline” and “Holly Holy”) had become big hits.

The folks back at the original label decided to capitalize on this success by giving “Shilo” a different backing track and releasing the new version as a single. This spiffed-up version reached #24 on Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart in April of 1970.

Diamond responded by re-recording the song (“with a quicker tempo, a tighter arrangement, and a bolder, if slightly less expressive vocal”) and including it on the reissued version of his 1968 album Velvet Gloves And Spit, which came out in late 1970 with a redesigned front cover that drew attention to the addition.

The song’s lyrics suggest that Shilo was female, but the name debuted in the baby name data for both genders in 1970. Shilo was the top girl-name debut of 1970, in fact. (Other dual-gender debuts include Dasani and Dondi.)

What are your thoughts on the baby name Shilo? Which spelling do you prefer?

Sources: Shilo – Neil Diamond | Song Info | AllMusic, Neil Diamond chart history – Billboard, SSA

Where did the baby name Dondi come from in 1956?

A panel from newspaper comic strip "Dondi" (Oct. 14, 1955)
The comic strip Dondi (Oct. 1955)

The comic strip Dondi was first published in September of 1955.

The strip featured a six-year-old Italian “mid-European” boy who was orphaned during WWII. When he was discovered by American soldiers, he was looking for his parents, crying out donde* (“where” in Spanish), so the soldiers dubbed him Dondi. He was discovered and befriended by a pair of American G.I.s who’d found him “cowering behind a rubble heap.”

When the soldiers were ordered back to the U.S., Dondi inadvertently smuggled himself into the U.S. by boarding the same boat as his “buddies.” Eventually he was adopted by one of the soldiers and “the early focus of the strip was Dondi’s discovery of America.”

In 1956, the name Dondi appeared for the first time — both as a boy name and as a girl name — in the U.S. baby name data:

Boys named DondiGirls named Dondi
19624824
196150†19
19601710
195914.
1958235
195732.
195619*7*
1955..
*Debut, †Peak usage

One of Dondi’s first namesakes was Stephen Dondi Thomas, born in late 1955 to Mr. and Mrs. Leslie F. Thomas of Dayton, Ohio.

The Thomases named him as they did because the illegal entry problems of the comic strip Dondi closely paralleled the experience of their daughter, Janie, 4.

Born in Italy to an Italian mother and an American father, Janie was facing deportation under the Immigration and Nationality Act.

Both the strip and the name peaked in popularity in the early ’60s. The strip ran until 1986; the name last appeared in the SSA data in 2002.

*Is donde used in Italian? Should the strip’s writers have used dove instead?

Update, Sept. 2017: My sources were wrong! I finally checked out the original strip. Turns out that Dondi’s name was not from donde — an explanation that never made much sense anyway — but from someone calling him a “dondi boy” (dandy boy). Here’s some of the Dondi dialogue that ran in mid-October, 1955:

“All right now, sonny, tell us your name.”

“My name Dondi!”

“Dondi what? What is your last name?”

“Dondi last name I ever have.”

“Come now, Dondi, didn’t you ever have some other name?”

“Long time ago pretty lady is holding me and saying ‘you dondiboy.’ So everybody is calling me Dondi.”

According to an interview with strip co-creator Irwin Hasen, the “pretty lady” was a Red Cross worker.

Sources:

  • “Comic Strip Orphan Gets a Namesake.” Chicago Tribune 26 Dec. 1955: C5.
  • Dondi – Don Markstein’s Toonopedia
  • Johnson., Steven K. “Goodbye.” Chicago Tribune 9 Jun. 1986.
  • Winslow, Rachel Rains. The Best Possible Immigrants: International Adoption and the American Family. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2017.

Baby names that debuted most impressively in the U.S. data, 1881 to today

lotus bud

Though most of the baby names in the SSA’s annual datasets are repeats, each dataset does contain a handful of brand-new names.

Below are the most popular debut names for every single year on record, after the first.

Why bother with an analysis like this? Because debut names often have cool stories behind them, and high-hitting debuts are especially likely to have intriguing explanations tied to historical people/events. So this is more than a list of names — it’s also a list of stories.

Here’s the format: “Girl name(s), number of baby girls; Boy name(s), number of baby boys.” Keep in mind that the raw numbers aren’t too trustworthy for about the first six decades, though. (More on that in a minute.)

1880s

  • 1881: Adell & Celeste, 14; Brown & Newell, 14
  • 1882: Verda, 14; Cleve, 13
  • 1883: Laurel, 12; Brady, Festus, Jewell, Odell & Rosco, 8
  • 1884: Crystal & Rubie, 11; Benjamen, Jens, Oakley & Whitney, 9
  • 1885: Clotilde, 13; Arley & Terence, 9
  • 1886: Manuelita, 10; Terrence, 10
  • 1887: Verlie, 13; Myles, 11
  • 1888: Ebba, 18; Carlisle, Hughie & Orvel, 9
  • 1889: Garnett, 12; Doyle, 9

1890s

  • 1890: Verena, 11; Eduardo & Maggie, 10
  • 1891: Gayle, Idabelle & Zenia, 9; Sheridan, 14
  • 1892: Astrid, Dallas & Jennett, 9; Corbett, 23
  • 1893: Elmyra, 12; Estel, Mayo, Shelley & Thorwald, 8
  • 1894: Beatriz, Carola & Marrie, 9; Arvel, Erby & Floy, 8
  • 1895: Trilby, 12; Roosevelt, 12
  • 1896: Lotus, 11; Hazen, 11
  • 1897: Dewey, 13; Bryon, Frankie, Mario & Rhoda, 7
  • 1898: Manilla, 35; Hobson, 38
  • 1899: Ardis & Irva, 19; Haven, 9

1900s

  • 1900: Luciel, 14; Rosevelt, 20
  • 1901: Venita, 11; Eino, 9
  • 1902: Mercie, 10; Clarnce, 9
  • 1903: Estela, 11; Lenon & Porfirio, 7
  • 1904: Magdaline, 9; Adrain, Arbie, Betty, Desmond, Domenic, Duard, Raul & Severo, 8
  • 1905: Oliver, 9; Eliot & Tyree, 9
  • 1906: Nedra, 11; Domenico & Ryan, 10
  • 1907: Theta, 20; Taft, 16
  • 1908: Pasqualina, 10; Robley, 12
  • 1909: Wilmoth, 9; Randal & Vidal, 9

1910s

1920s

  • 1920: Dardanella, 23; Steele, 11
  • 1921: Marilynne, 13; Norberto, 14
  • 1922: Evelean, 14; Daren, 35
  • 1923: Nalda, 15; Clinard & Dorland, 9
  • 1924: Charis, 14; Melquiades, 13
  • 1925: Irmalee, 37; Wayburn, 11
  • 1926: Narice, 13; Bibb, 14
  • 1927: Sunya, 14; Bidwell, 14
  • 1928: Joreen, 22; Alfread & Brevard, 9
  • 1929: Jeannene, 25; Donnald, Edsol, Rhys & Wolfgang, 8

1930s

(From the SSA: “Note that many people born before 1937 never applied for a Social Security card, so their names are not included in our data.”)

1940s

1950s

1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

2000s

  • 2000: Kelis, 108; Rithik, 22
  • 2001: Yaire, 184; Jahiem, 155
  • 2002: Kaydence, 70; Omarian, 31
  • 2003: Trenyce, 88; Pharrell, 67
  • 2004: Eshal, 38; Jkwon, 100
  • 2005: Yarisbel, 30; Jayceon, 48
  • 2006: Lizania, 35; Balian, 24
  • 2007: Leilene, 81; Yurem, 206
  • 2008: Aideliz, 91; Yosgart, 72
  • 2009: Greidys, 186; Jeremih, 87

2010s

2020s

I’ve already written about some of the names above, and I plan to write about all the others as well…eventually. In the meanwhile, if you want to beat me to it and leave a comment about why Maverick hit in 1957, or why Moesha hit in 1996, feel free!

Source: U.S. SSA

Image: Adapted from LotusBud0048a (public domain) by Frank “Fg2” Gualtieri

[Latest update: May 2025]

Where did the baby name Trace come from in 1956?

The character Trace Jordan from the movie "The Burning Hills" (1956).
Trace Jordan from “The Burning Hills“

The name Trace left its first trace in the U.S. baby name data in 1956:

  • 1958: 20 baby boys named Trace
  • 1957: 17 baby boys named Trace
  • 1956: 17 baby boys named Trace [debut]
  • 1955: unlisted
  • 1954: unlisted

It was the 2nd-highest debut on the boys’ list that year after the comics-inspired Dondi.

So what inspired Trace?

A Western called The Burning Hills (1956) that starred Tab Hunter and Natalie Wood.

Tab Hunter played Trace Jordan, whose name was appropriate given the fact that he was able to track down his brother’s killers based on the traces they left behind:

Evidence found near Johnny’s body reveals that several men were present during his murder: one with a limp, one with elaborate spurs, and one who smoked a certain type of cigarette.

Much of the rest of the movie involves tracking as well, but in the other direction (i.e., the bad guys trying to find Trace).

In the late 1990s, the usage of the name jumped thanks to a different Trace: country singer Trace Adkins (b. 1962), whose birth name was actually Tracy.

What do you think of the name Trace? How do you like it compared to similar-sounding names like Chase, Jace, Case, and Ace?

Sources: The Burning Hills – TCM, SSA