How popular is the baby name Elmo 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 Elmo.

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Popularity of the baby name Elmo


Posts that mention the name Elmo

Finnish baby named after Donald Duck

Finnish professional golfers Minea Blomqvist and Roope Kakko welcomed their first child, a baby boy, on the last day of March.

They were going to name their son Elmeri Mikael, but right after he was born they threw in a third name: Aku — in honor of Donald Duck.

The Disney character Donald Duck, who is something of a cultural icon in the Nordic countries, is called Aku Ankka in Finland. Aku is short for the name Aukusti, the Finnish form of Augustus, while ankka is the Finnish word for duck.

The baby’s birth date (in European format) is 31/3, which immediately reminded Minea of Aku Ankka’s license plate, 313. So she and Roope added “Aku” to their son’s name, making it Elmeri Aku Mikael.

Which is rather fitting, as Roope and Minni (Minea’s nickname) are the Finnish names of Scrooge McDuck (Donald’s wealthy uncle) and Minnie Mouse.

But they’re going to call Elmeri by the nickname “Elmo.” Here’s why:

In Finland we have a sport book that’s called Elmo. He’s a sport person. He wins everything. Even in hundred meters he falls, but he still wins. It’s kind of like a magical book when you are a big sport hero. My boyfriend loves sport, and we follow ice hockey, so we thought that’s a great name for my son.

Sources:

Image by Kin Li from Unsplash

Baby names you can write with a single line in cursive: Cleo, Rhys, Edward, Ursula

Declaration of Independence (detail)

I wrote a letter to a friend not long ago, and the act of writing something longhand (which I rarely do anymore) made me wonder: which baby names can be written in cursive without lifting the pen from the page?

Turns out that many names can be written this way — so long as they don’t contain letters that need crossing/dotting (t, i, x, j) and don’t start with a tricky capital such as W or X.

Here are some examples of names that can be written in script with one continuous line of ink.

  • 3 letters: Ava, Moe, Ned, Rob, Ula
  • 4 letters: Cleo, Elmo, Jada, Rhys, Zane
  • 5 letters: Carla, Jesse, Nancy, Ryder, Yosef
  • 6 letters: Edward, Jazmyn, Morgan, Nelson, Ursula
  • 7 letters: Charles, Eleanor, Jeffrey, Malcolm, Rebecca
  • 8 letters: Alphonso, Emmanuel, Mercedes, Mohammad, Randolph
  • 9 letters: Cleveland, Esperanza, Jefferson, Magdalena, Rosabelle
  • 10 letters: Alessandra, Alessandro, Clarabella, Clarabelle, Jacquelynn

For more onomastic trivia, try this list of baby names that can be typed one-handed on a QWERTY keyboard.

Image: Adapted from United States Declaration of Independence (public domain)

Most popular first letter-pairs of U.S. baby names

Mathematically speaking, it’s possible to construct 676 pairs of letters from a 26-letter alphabet. In terms of baby names, though, only a portion of these pairs can realistically be used to start a baby name.

If you look at each of the 6,692 names that have ever ranked among the most popular U.S. (1880-2006), you’ll notice that only 233 two-letter combinations have ever been used at the beginning of the names (e.g., “Na-” for Nancy, or “Ev-” for Evan).

So…what’s the most common pair of starting letters?

Ma– is the clear winner. It starts nearly twice as many names as Ja-, the second most common starting letter-pair.

Here’s a more detailed breakdown of all the two-letter combinations that have started at least 100 ranked baby names:

  • 331 “Ma-” names (Mark, Mandy, Matthias, Marylouise)
  • 177 “Ja-” names (Jane, Jacob, Jaleesa, Jamarion)
  • 174 “Al-” names (Alf, Alice, Alphonso, Albertina)
  • 167 “De-” names (Dean, Della, Devontae, Demetria)
  • 157 “Ka-” names (Karl, Katie, Kameron, Katharina)
  • 144 “Sh-” names (Shane, Sherman, Shanice, Sheridan)
  • 143 “Ca-” names (Cash, Cadence, Carmella, Casimiro)
  • 139 “Da-” names (Dave, Daisy, Damarcus, Dayanara)
  • 125 “El-” names (Elmo, Elyse, Elijah, Eleanora)
  • 121 “Ro-” names (Ross, Roxie, Roosevelt, Rosalinda)
  • 118 “Br-” names (Bruce, Brenda, Bryson, Brittany)
  • 118 “Ch-” names (Chad, Chantal, Christopher, Christiana)
  • 117 “La-” names (Lane, Laura, Lafayette, Lakeshia)
  • 113 “Le-” names (Les, Leah, Leandra, Leopoldo)
  • 102 “Je-” names (Jeff, Jewel, Jennifer, Jeremiah)
  • 101 “Jo-” names (John, Joanna, Joshua, Josefina)
  • 100 “Ar-” names (Art, Arla, Armani, Araceli)