How popular is the baby name Hiawatha 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 Hiawatha.

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Popularity of the baby name Hiawatha


Posts that mention the name Hiawatha

Where did the baby name Nokomis come from in the 1910s?

The characters Nokomis, Suzette, and Suzette's mother from the silent film "Witchcraft" (1916).
Nokomis (standing) from “Witchcraft“

The unusual name Nokomis debuted in the U.S. baby name data way back in 1916:

  • 1918: unlisted
  • 1917: 6 baby girls named Nokomis
  • 1916: 5 baby girls named Nokomis [debut]
  • 1915: unlisted
  • 1914: unlisted

Why?

My guess is the silent film Witchcraft, which was released in October of 1916.

The film, set in colonial New England, had as a supporting character a Native American woman named Nokomis (played by actress Lillian Leighton).

(The movie’s main character, a young Huguenot woman named Suzette, seems to have given a boost to the name Suzette in 1916 as well.)

Nokomis’ name was probably borrowed from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha (1855). In the epic poem, Nokomis — who fell to earth from the full moon — was the grandmother of the fictional Ojibwe hero Hiawatha.

The name Nokomis is based on the Ojibwe word nookomis, which means “my grandmother.”

What are your thoughts on the name Nokomis?

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Gale Storm named her baby after a TV character

Gale Storm

Actress and singer Gale Storm wasn’t born with that name — she was born Josephine Owaissa Cottle in Texas in 1922. (Her four older siblings were named Lois, Wilbur, Minnie, and Joel.)

Her first name came from her paternal grandmother, and her unusual middle was chosen by her older sister Lois. Here’s how she explained it:

Owaissa means bluebird in Indian. They let my sister name me and she was going through an Indian period then.

Lois had likely encountered the name in school, via Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s 1855 poem “The Song of Hiawatha” — a fictional account of an Ojibwe warrior named Hiawatha. The name is indeed defined as “bluebird” in the poem, though the Ojibwe word for “bluebird” is actually more along the lines of ozahwunoo.

In her late teens, Josephine became a contestant on a radio talent show called Gateway to Hollywood. She ended up winning, and was awarded not only a contract with a movie studio, but a brand new name: Gale Storm. The male winner, Lee Bonnell, who was given the stage name Terry Belmont, later became Gale’s real-life husband.

Gale and Terry went on to have four children. Their three sons were named after the Biblical figures of Philip, Peter and Paul. But their daughter, born in 1956, was not named with a Biblical figure in mind. Instead, she was named after fictional cruise director Susanna Pomeroy — the character Gale Storm portrayed on The Gale Storm Show: Oh! Susanna from 1956 to 1960.

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