How popular is the baby name Mark 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 Mark.

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Popularity of the baby name Mark


Posts that mention the name Mark

Acts of the Apostles…as a baby name

Here’s a story I’ve spotted a couple of times:

A couple of centuries ago, Thomas and Elizabeth Pegden of Kent, England, had four sons named Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Then they had a fifth son. They were out of evangelists, so what did they name baby #5? Acts of the Apostles, after the next book in the New Testament.

Is it a true story?

Sort of.

A man named Actsapostles Pegden was indeed born in Kent back in 1795. (He went by the nickname “Actsy.” He married in 1826, and passed away in 1865.)

And his parents were named Thomas and Elizabeth Pegden.

And he did have at least four older brothers.

But the brothers I’ve found were named Thomas (b. 1787), Philip (b. 1789), Isaac (b. 1791) and Christopher (b. 1793) — not Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

So how did he get his name?

I’m not sure.

The only two other people I’ve come across with this name — Acts of the Apostles Kennett (b. 1833), son of Richard and Phoebe Kennett, and Acts of the Apostles Tong (b. 1850), son of Henry and Mary Tong — were both born in Kent, just like Actsy. This makes me think the name has more to do with regional religious fervor than anything else.

Sources:

  • “A Curious Christian Name.” New York Times 16 Apr. 1899: 24.
  • Bardsley, Charles Wareing Endell. Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature. London: Chatto & Windus, 1897.
  • “‘Acts-Apostles’ as a Name.” Notes and Queries 3 Mar. 1866: 175.

What turned Blue into a baby name in 1968?

Movie poster for "Blue" (1968)
“Blue”

Decades before Beyoncé had daughter Blue Ivy (2012), and years before Cher had son Elijah Blue (1976), the color-name Blue debuted in the U.S. baby name data:

  • 1970: 10 baby boys named Blue
  • 1969: 13 baby boys named Blue
  • 1968: 11 baby boys named Blue [debut]
  • 1967: unlisted
  • 1966: unlisted

What put it there initially?

I have two theories.

The first is Billy Blue “Blue Boy” Cannon, a character from the TV western The High Chaparral, which started airing in September of 1967. Blue Boy, played by actor Mark Slade, was a young man who was the son of main character, “Big John” Cannon. (The show also launched the name Manolito.)

The second is the movie Blue, which was released April of 1968. It was a western in which the main character, played by Terence Stamp, was called Azul on account of his blue-colored eyes. The movie was panned — critic Roger Ebert said Blue was “not just a bad movie, but a painfully inept one” — and it didn’t do well at the box office, but the advertising campaign may have been enough.

(Incidentally, the name Blue was used again in the title of a western just a few years later with the release of Kid Blue (1973) starring Dennis Hopper.)

What are your thoughts on Blue as a baby name? Do you like it better as a male name or as a female name? How about as a first vs. as a middle?

Sources: Review of Blue (1968) by Roger Ebert, SSA

Celebrity baby name: Felix

Title of the TV series "The X-Files"
“The X-Files”

Actress Gillian Anderson, one of the stars of sci-fi TV series The X-Files (1993-2002), welcomed a baby boy last week.

She and her partner, Mark Griffiths, named their son Felix — which just so happens to be an anagram of “X File.”

Coincidence…?

The couple’s first child, born in 2006, was a son named Oscar.

Anderson also has a daughter, Piper Maru, with her ex-husband. (She said during a 1996 radio interview that the middle name Maru means “calm and gentle” in Polynesian and “ship” in Japanese.)

Source: Finn, Natalie. “Another Son Shines for Gillian Anderson.” E! Online 20 Oct. 2008.

Baby name story: Sarah McCain Palin

Mark Ciptak of Tennessee has named his third child Sarah McCain Palin after John McCain and Sarah Palin.

Alarmingly, he did it behind his wife’s back. She apparently signed her name to the paperwork without realizing her husband had written “Sarah McCain Palin” in the spot where “Ava Grace” should have been.

He said:

We actually came up with the name Ava Grace, and I secretively went and got another set of forms to send to (Social Security officials and the Tennessee Department of Health), and as of this time, she (Layla) still doesn’t realize what I’ve done. I haven’t broken the news to her yet.

As of right now, I’m just trying to get up enough nerve to tell her what I’ve done and hope for the best. I hope I’m still living to tell the tale tomorrow. She thought it was a done deal with Ava Grace.

After he did tell her, later the same day, he said:

I don’t think she believes me yet. It’s going to take some more convincing.

Interestingly, Ciptak went on to say that he believed they’d be changing the name back to Ava: “[T]hat is more than likely going to be it, unless my wife wants to keep what I officially named (her).”

He’d been motivated to choose the name “Sarah McCain Palin” because he wanted to do his part to support the McCain/Palin campaign.

(Incidentally, their two older children are named Annika and Isaiah.)

Your thoughts on this?

Source: Carter County man surprises wife, names baby Sarah McCain Palin