How popular is the baby name Keith 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 Keith.

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Popularity of the baby name Keith


Posts that mention the name Keith

What turned Silk into a baby name in 1993?

Silk's album "Lose Control" (1992)
Silk album

The word Silk has appeared just once so far in the U.S. baby name data, in 1993:

  • 1995: unlisted
  • 1994: unlisted
  • 1993: 8 baby girls named Silk [debut]
  • 1992: unlisted
  • 1991: unlisted

Where did it come from?

Music. Specifically, the Atlanta-based group Silk (one of the many “sexually suggestive R&B vocal groups that followed Jodeci“).

Silk’s biggest hit, the slow jam “Freak Me,” was the #1 song on Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart for two weeks in May of 1993. Two other Silk songs, “Girl U For Me” and “Happy Days,” also reached the Hot 100 that year, peaking at 26th and 86th respectively.

Silk was the first band signed to Keith Sweat’s record label Keia, which was founded in late 1992. The label was presumably named after Sweat’s daughter, Keia, who was born the same year. (The baby name Keia saw peak usage in 1993, but this probably has more to do with a TV commercial featuring a girl named Kia than with Keith Sweat’s daughter, or label.)

The word “silk” can be traced back to the ancient Greek word serikos, which referred to the Seres people of Asia. The Seres supplied the ancient Greeks with silks via the Silk Road.

What are your thoughts on Silk as a name?

Sources: Silk Biography – AllMusic, Silk – Billboard, Silk – Etymonline, SSA

Where did the baby name Keefe come from in 1952?

Actor Keefe Brasselle in the movie "The Eddie Cantor Story" (1953)
Keefe Brasselle in “The Eddie Cantor Story“

The curious name Keefe first emerged in the U.S. baby name data in 1952:

  • 1954: 9 baby boys named Keefe
  • 1953: 5 baby boys named Keefe
  • 1952: 5 baby boys named Keefe [debut]
  • 1951: unlisted
  • 1950: unlisted

What put it there?

Actor Keefe Brasselle. He was was a relative newcomer in the early ’50s, and his biggest role was as entertainer Eddie Cantor in the much anticipated movie The Eddie Cantor Story, which came out in late 1953. (The filmmakers were hoping to duplicate the success of 1946 biopic The Jolson Story.)

He was making headlines as early as mid-1952 just for landing the part. One paper said in April of ’52: “This role could, and probably will, make Brasselle a great star.”

Unfortunately, the movie got mixed reviews, and Brasselle’s performance as Cantor was described with words like “uncomfortable,” “exaggerated,” and “disconcerting.” It wasn’t the big break he thought it would be, in other words.

Keefe continued appearing in small roles during the 1950s. In 1963, got another shot with The Keefe Brasselle Show — a summer replacement for The Garry Moore Show — but the series was similarly unsuccessful. It did lead to a spike in the usage of the baby name Keefe in ’63, though.

What are your thoughts on the baby name Keefe? Do you like it more or less than Keith?

Sources:

Image: Screenshot of the trailer for the movie The Eddie Cantor Story

Baby name story: Tara Gabriel Galaxy Gramaphone

John Paul Getty II and Talitha Pol on their wedding day in Rome (Dec. 1966)
John Paul Getty II and Talitha Pol

Most of us have heard of J. Paul Getty, who was one of the wealthiest people in America during his lifetime. But most of us have probably not heard that one of his grandchildren was named “Gramaphone” (a misspelling of gramophone).

This particular grandchild was the son of Eugene Paul Getty, who later went by John Paul Getty II, and his second wife, Dutch fashion model and socialite Talitha Pol. (They married in late 1966; you can see a corresponding uptick in the usage of the name Talitha the following year.)

The couple were the toast of Europe’s glamour-hippie set, jetting to exotic spots with the likes of Mick Jagger. “J. P. II’s whole young-adult life,” says [family friend Stuart] Evey, “was Marrakech and the Rolling Stones.”

To French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent, the pair epitomized “the youthfulness of the sixties”:

Talitha and Paul Getty lying on a starlit terrace in Marrakesh, beautiful and damned, and a whole generation assembled as if for eternity where the curtain of the past seemed to lift before an extraordinary future.

In 1968, Paul and Talitha couple welcomed their only child, a son.

They named him Tara Gabriel Gramaphone Galaxy Getty.

In 1971, Talitha died of a heroin overdose. Her death occurred “in the 12-month period that also saw the deaths of Edie Sedgwick, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, and Janis Joplin.”

(Tragedy struck John Paul II’s family again in 1973 when his eldest son, John Paul III, was kidnapped by the Calabrian mafia.)

Tara Gabriel Galaxy Gramaphone Getty has long since dropped both “Gramaphone” and “Galaxy” from his full name.

Today, he and his wife Jessica live in South Africa on the Phinda Game Reserve. They have three kids named Orlando, Caspar, and Talitha.

Update, Aug. 16th: In 1976, Keith Richards (of The Rolling Stones) and model Anita Pallenberg welcomed a son they named Tara in honor of late friend (and Guinness heir) Tara Browne, who’d died in 1966. Paul and Talitha had been part of the same social set during the ’60s…was their son named with Tara Browne in mind as well?

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Wedding of John Paul Getty Jr. and Talitha Pol (Rome, 1966) (public domain)

Celebrity baby name: Sunday

Actress Nicole Kidman and her husband, musician Keith Urban, welcomed a baby girl earlier today. They named her Sunday (…despite the fact that she was born on a Monday).

Kidman also has two adopted children, Connor and Isabella, from her earlier marriage to Tom Cruise.

Update, 7/8/08: According to Australian newspaper The Daily Telegraph, the name was inspired by Sunday Reed, a patron of the arts in Australia and the “muse” of artist Sidney Nolan.