How popular is the baby name Jacy 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 Jacy.
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Other spellings of the name (like Jacy, Jacey, Jaycee, and Jayci) also saw increased usage that year.
What was the influence?
U.S. gymnast Jaycie Phelps. She was part of the 1996 U.S. women’s gymnastics team — the “Magnificent Seven” — that won gold at the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. The U.S. gold broke Soviet Union’s decades-long winning streak in the women’s team all-around.
Jaycie Phelps, who was born and raised in Indiana, is now back in her home state running the Jaycie Phelps Athletic Center.
What are your thoughts on the name Jaycie? (What spelling do you prefer?)
P.S. The other six gymnasts on the U.S. team that year were named Amanda, Amy, Dominique (2), Kerri, and Shannon.
While other mid-20th-century actors and actresses were swapping out their birth names for catchy stage names (like Rory Calhoun, Lana Turner, Kirk Douglas, Piper Laurie, Tab Hunter, and Rock Hudson), Cloris Leachman decided to go against the grain and stick with her legal name (which she’d inherited from her mother).
But she did consider changing her name for a time…thanks largely to Tallulah Bankhead.
In 1949, Cloris was in her early 20s and appearing on stage in Come Back, Little Sheba. Bankhead came to see the production, and, afterwards, when the two women met for the first time, Tallulah implored Cloris to change her name.
On a different occasion, Bankhead brought the topic up again:
“Cloris Leachman,” she crowed, “too long. Too many syllables. Too unknown. Clorox Bleachman would be better. You can’t even fit it on the marquee in front of a theater.”
During that second interaction, Cloris came up with the potential stage name “April Claiborne” by combining her birth month with her youngest sister’s first name. (“Claiborne” was their paternal grandmother’s maiden name.)
She still wasn’t sure about making the change, though.
When I went to the Actors Studio the next day, I talked about Madame Bankhead’s rant. They all agreed with her. “You have to change your name! You have to!,” they cried. It was a unanimous opinion. So right there we got out the New York phone book. It opened it up to the Ls, closed my eyes, and the name under my finger was Leavitt. It was miraculous. That translated to “Leave it!” This is no accident, I thought. The god of monikers is talking, and he says leave it. Okay, I’ll leave it.
When I got to Hollywood, the subject came up again. People said I should not only change my name, I should have my nose shortened. I emphatically didn’t want to do either, and that’s why I’m still Cloris Leachman with a big nose.
Her first name, a variant spelling of the ancient Greek name Chloris (meaning “greenish-yellow, pale green”), is closely related to the name Chloe (meaning “green shoot”).
The name Jacy, which had been in the U.S. baby name data since the early ’60s, saw a modest jump in usage in 1972:
1974: 47 baby girls named Jacy
1973: 36 baby girls named Jacy
1972: 25 baby girls named Jacy
1971: 9 baby girls named Jacy
1970: 7 baby girls named Jacy
Why?
Because of the coming-of-age film The Last Picture Show, which was released in October of 1971.
The film, shot in black-and-white upon the advice of Orson Welles, was set in north Texas in the early 1950s. One of the main characters was Jacy Farrow (played by Cybill Shepherd), who was both the prettiest and the wealthiest girl in the small town of Anarene.
The Last Picture Show was one of the highest-grossing films of 1971, and ended up with eight Oscar nominations (and two wins — for supporting actor Ben Johnson and supporting actress Cloris Leachman).
The movie was based on the 1966 semi-autobiographical novel of the same name by Larry McMurtry, who was also the writer behind the movie Hud.
The name Jacy saw another rise in usage in the early 1990s, possibly because The Last Picture Show‘s sequel, Texasville, came out in mid-1990.
The first time Jacy popped up in the U.S. baby name data, in 1912, it was a boy name. When it made a return in the early ’60s, it was a girl name:
1963: 13 baby girls named Jacy
1962: 15 baby girls named Jacy
1961: 13 baby girls named Jacy
1960: unlisted
1959: unlisted
The return was prompted by Brazilian fashion model Jacy DeSouza, who was featured in the African-American magazines Jet and Ebony in the late ’50s and early ’60s. She appeared on one Ebony cover and three Jet covers from 1960 to 1963.
Jacy had been modeling professionally in Italy for several years when she met the director of the annual Ebony Fashion Fair. A few years later, she began participating in the traveling fashion show and appearing in the two magazines (both of which were owned by same company).
She’s last mentioned/pictured in the magazines in late 1963. I’m not sure what became of her after that.
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