How popular is the baby name Leslie 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 Leslie.
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One of last week’s post featured Glenna Lee McCarthy, whose father was famous Texas oil prospector and entrepreneur Glenn McCarthy (1907-1988).
Writer Edna Ferber fictionalized Glenn’s rags-to-riches life story in her novel Giant (1952) with the character Jett Rink.
The book was later made into a movie, which came out in October of 1956.
Jett was played by James Dean, who died in a car accident a month before the film premiered.
The other two main characters were Jordan “Bick” Benedict (played by Rock Hudson) and his wife Leslie Benedict (Elizabeth Taylor). Secondary characters included the Benedicts’ son Jordan, or “Jordy” (Dennis Hopper) and a neighbor named Vashti (Jane Withers).
The movie did well at the box office and was nominated for various Academy Awards, including a posthumous Best Actor nomination for Dean. It also gave a boost to several baby names.
Jett and Leslie from “Giant“
In 1957, the year after the movie was released, the name Jett saw its then-highest-ever usage (a level that wasn’t surpassed until the 1980s).
Leslie — which had started being given more often to baby girls than to baby boys about a decade earlier — saw its highest-ever usage as a girl name in 1957:
1958: 6,010 baby girls named Leslie [rank: 79th]
1957: 6,101 baby girls named Leslie [rank: 77th] (peak usage)
1956: 4,386 baby girls named Leslie [rank: 104th]
1955: 4,403 baby girls named Leslie [rank: 99th]
1954: 4,148 baby girls named Leslie [rank: 99th]
Usage of the baby name Leslie
And Vashti, like Jordan, more than doubled in usage:
If you’re on the hunt for baby names with a numerological value of 8, you’re in luck! Because today’s post features hundreds of 8-names.
Before we get to the names, though — how do we know that they’re “eights” in numerology?
Turning names into numbers
Here’s how to calculate the numerological value of a name.
First, for each letter, come up with a number to represent that letter’s position in the alphabet. (Letter A would be number 1, letter B would be number 2, and so forth.) Then, add all the numbers together. If the sum has two or more digits, add the digits together recursively until the result is a single digit. That single digit is the name’s numerological value.
For instance, the letters in the name Wyatt correspond to the numbers 23, 25, 1, 20, and 20. The sum of these numbers is 89. The digits of 89 added together equal 17, and the digits of 17 added together equal 8 — the numerological value of Wyatt.
Baby names with a value of 8
Below you’ll find the most popular 8-names per gender, according to the latest U.S. baby name data. I’ve further sub-categorized them by total sums — just in case any of those larger numbers are significant to anyone.
8
The letters in the following baby names add up to 8.
Girl name (8)
Boy name (8)
Bea
Abe
8 via 17
The letters in the following baby names add up to 17, which reduces to eight (1+7=8).
Girl names (8 via 17)
Boy names (8 via 17)
Gia, Bo, Afia, Eabha, Cala
Bo, Mac, Cam, Md, Jeb
8 via 26
The letters in the following baby names add up to 26, which reduces to eight (2+6=8).
Girl names (8 via 26)
Boy names (8 via 26)
Leah, Maci, Jana, Pia, Dua, Gema, Calia, Brea, Cami
Eli, Bear, Bode, Obed, Asaad, Adil
8 via 35
The letters in the following baby names add up to 35, which reduces to eight (3+5=8).
There’s no definitive answer, unfortunately, because various numerological systems exist, and each one has its own interpretation of the number eight. That said, if we look at a couple of modern numerology/astrology websites, we see 8 being described as “successful,” “ambitious,” “organized,” “practical,” and “authoritative.”
We can also look at associations, which are a bit more concrete. Here are some things that are associated with the number 8:
Figure 8
Infinity symbol
Analemma (diagram showing the position of the sun over the course of a year)
Figure-eight knot
Octopus (8 arms)
Spider (8 legs)
8-bit computing
8-track cartridge
Eight-ball (in pool)
Magic 8 Ball (fortune-telling toy)
Eight-ender (perfect score in the sport of curling)
What does the number 8 mean to you? What are your strongest associations with the number?
P.S. To see names with other numerological values, check out the posts for the numbers one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and nine.
“Everly” is hot…”Beverly” is not. It’s a one-letter difference between fashionable and fusty.
If you’re sensitive to style, you’ll prefer Everly. It fits with today’s trends far better than Beverly does.
But if you’re someone who isn’t concerned about style, or prefers to go against style, then you may not automatically go for Everly. In fact, you may be more attracted to Beverly because it’s the choice that most modern parents would avoid.
If you’ve ever thought about intentionally giving your baby a dated name (like Debbie, Grover, Marcia, or Vernon) for the sake of uniqueness within his/her peer group — if you have no problem sacrificing style for distinctiveness — then this list is for you.
Years ago, the concept of “contrarian” baby names came up in the comments of a post about Lois. Ever since then, creating a collection of uncool/contrarian baby names has been on my to-do list.
Finally, last month, I experimented with various formulas for pulling unstylish baby names out of the SSA dataset. Keeping the great-grandparent rule in mind, I aimed for names that would have been fashionable among the grandparents of today’s babies. The names below are the best results I got.
Interestingly, thirteen of the names above — Bobbie, Cary, Dale, Jackie, Jimmie, Jody, Kerry, Kim, Lynn, Robin, Sandy, Tracey, Tracy — managed to make both lists.
Now some questions for you…
Do you like any of these names? Would you be willing to use any of them on a modern-day baby? Why or why not?
Leslie Hills worked as a teacher in Scotland for several decades starting in the 1960s. Writing about her experiences in the 1990s, she mentioned Senga Syndrome:
Years later I heard my experience summed up by a very senior official in Lothian Region. The Senga Syndrome he called it and when pressed for an explanation by his male east-coast audience, explained that Senga, a name found only among the working classes in the West, was Agnes backwards and Senga was the typical Glasgow working class girl from a state school, who goes to Glasgow University, does an Ordinary degree, goes to Jordanhill College and returns, if she has ever left, to live near and teach in her old school or very close to it. Unfortunately this cruel description was largely accurate.
Senga Syndrome reminds me of Germany’s Kevinismus. In both cases, a certain name emerged to symbolize (in a derogatory way) a particular group or class.
Senga, FWIW, might be Agnes backwards, or it might be based on the Scottish Gaelic word seang, meaning “slender, lanky.”
Sources:
Hills, Leslie. “The Senga Syndrome: Reflections on Twenty-One Years in Scottish Education.” Identity and Diversity: Gender and the Experience of Education, edited by Maud Blair, Janet Holland, and Sue Sheldon, The Open University, 1995, 51-60.
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