How popular is the baby name Marie 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 Marie.

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Popularity of the baby name Marie


Posts that mention the name Marie

Where did the baby name Chakakhan come from in 1975?

Album "Rufus featuring Chaka Khan" (1975)
“Rufus featuring Chaka Khan” (1975)

When Grammy-winning singer Chaka Khan was born in Chicago in 1953, her name was Yvette Marie Stevens.

During her teens, Yvette “met a Yoruba priest who gave her a new name…based on her orishas, or guiding spirits.” Her new names, in order, were Chaka, Adunne, Aduffe, Yemoja, Hodarhi, and Karifi.

A few years later, she married for the first time and took her husband’s surname, Khan.

Hence, the stage name Chaka Khan.

Chaka joined the funk band Rufus in 1972.

In 1975, they released their fourth studio album, Rufus featuring Chaka Khan, which included the popular single “Sweet Thing.”

That year and the next, the compound name Chakakhan appeared in the U.S. baby name data:

  • 1977: unlisted
  • 1976: 16 baby girls named Chakakhan
  • 1975: 21 baby girls named Chakakhan [debut]
  • 1974: unlisted
  • 1973: unlisted

Very likely these parents wrote the name with the space and the capital “K,” but it’s not rendered that way in the data because the SSA strips out things like spaces and internal capitalization.

The baby name Chaka also became more popular, but only for baby girls (many of whom were probably given Khan as a middle name):

Girls named ChakaBoys named Chaka
19778716
1976147 (rank: 899th)20
197512018
197415*18
1973.18
*Debut

It has since dropped off the list entirely for both genders.

Chaka Khan eventually left Rufus and began a solo career, and in 2011 she was given the 2,440th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Source: Ollison, Rashod D. “Through the Fire.” Sun [Baltimore] 28 Oct. 2003: 1E.

Maureen and Mavourneen: Too close for twin names?

Maureen O’Connor, former San Diego mayor (1986-1992), was charged with money laundering in federal court earlier this month.

I don’t know much about the situation, but I was intrigued to learn that Maureen had 12 siblings, including a twin sister with a very similar name — Mavourneen.

(The other siblings are Patrick, Michael, Dennis, Sharon, Dianne, Colleen, Sheila, Timothy, Karen, Thomas and Shawn.)

The names Maureen and Mavourneen (pronounced muh-VOOR-neen) are both Irish, but they have different etymologies:

Maureen is an anglicized form of Máirín, which is a pet form of Máire, which — like the English name Mary — is based on the French name Marie, which comes from the Latin name Maria. In ancient Rome, Maria was originally a feminine form of Marius, but it was later popularized as a version of the Hebrew name Miriam. The meaning of Miriam is unknown, though hypothesized definitions abound: “beloved,” “rebellious,” “strong sea,” “bitter sea,” “drop of the sea,” etc.

Mavourneen is an anglicized form of the Irish phrase mo mhúirnín, meaning “my darling.” It began as a term of endearment, but morphed into a given name probably when the song “Kathleen Mavourneen” (1837) became popular in the mid-1800s. (A number of the 19th-century Mavourneens I’ve tracked down were named “Kathleen Mavourneen.” Many of the 20th century Mavourneens too, actually.)

In terms of popularity, Maureen was one of the top 100 baby names in the U.S. from 1947 until 1954. Mavourneen, on the other hand, has never cracked the U.S. top 1,000.

And now the main question: What do you think of the names Maureen and Mavourneen for twins? Cute? Too close? Somewhere in between?

[Related post: How Similar Should Twin Names Be?]

Baby name story: Sea Bee

Marie Fouchard holding baby Séa Beé (1944)
Marie Fouchard holding baby Séa Beé

On July 2, 1944 — just a few weeks after D-Day — a Frenchwoman in the Norman village of Sainte-­Marie-du-Mont went into labor.

U.S. Navy Seabee medical officers in Normandy received word that the woman was in need of emergency medical assistance, so they sent a doctor. (The Seabees are part of the U.S. Naval Construction Battalion; the word “Seabee” comes from the acronym “C.B.”)

The Seabee doctor arrived just moments after the birth of a baby girl. He immediately began to render postnatal care.

In the days that followed, the medical staff of the battalion paid many visits to the home of Henri and Marie Fouchard.

In honor of the Seabees, the Fouchards named their daughter Séa Beé Paule Fouchard.

Portion of Séa Beé Paule Fouchard's birth certificate (1944)
Séa Beé’s birth certificate

Sources:

Images: U.S. Navy Seabee Museum

Baby born on bridge, named Poncella (“bridge”)

poncella

On April 21, 1935, there was a traffic jam on the High Level Bridge in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

In the back of a taxicab stuck on the bridge, a baby girl was born to Mrs. Edward Beauchamp.

The Beauchamps asked the public for help naming the baby, and the Edmonton Journal turned it into a contest, putting up a $5 prize.

Now Mr. Beauchamp has suggested to the Journal that it think of a name for his baby daughter and which is symbolical of the event, and having due regard to the fact that it occurred on the high level bridge.

We thought of Bridget or Bridgette, or maybe “Girda,” but we are leaving it to Journal readers. The successful name, of course, must be acceptable to the parents.

(“Girda” would be a reference to a girder bridge.)

The winning name, suggested by a twelve-year-old girl, was “Poncella” — roughly “this one from the bridge” in French. (The French word for “bridge” is pont.)

The baby’s full name was Olive Marie Poncella Beauchamp.

Sources:

  • Christensen, Jo-Anne and Dennis Shappka. An Edmonton Album: Glimpses of the Way We Were. Toronto: Dundurn Press Ltd., 1999
  • “‘Who’s Got a Pretty Name for Me?’ Is the High Level Taxicab Baby’s Plea.” Edmonton Journal. (See image; I don’t know the date or page number.)