Actress Myrna Loy appeared in “eighty-odd pictures” during the late 1920s and early 1930s before The Thin Man — the film that finally turned her into a star — came out in May of 1934.
A box office hit that garnered four Academy Award nominations, The Thin Man ultimately grew into a franchise that included six feature films — all starring Loy (along with co-star William Powell).
As Loy’s fame grew during the latter half of the 1930s, the baby name Myrna saw a corresponding rise in usage:
- 1939: 1,600 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 144th]
- 1938: 1,801 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 134th] – peak usage
- 1937: 1,652 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 137th]
- 1936: 1,396 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 149th]
- 1935: 1,059 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 176th]
- 1934: 836 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 211th]
- 1933: 571 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 254th]
- 1932: 422 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 307th]
- 1931: 415 baby girls named Myrna [rank: 315th]
Here’s a visual:
So, how did the actress, who was born in Montana in 1905, come to be named “Myrna”?
Here’s how she told the story in her 1987 autobiography:
One of my father’s duties was taking the cattle to market in Chicago, traveling in stock cars, sleeping in the caboose. I was on the way in 1905 when he happened to stop near Broken Bow, Nebraska, on the Burlington Railroad. It wasn’t a proper station, really, just a whistle-stop where you got water or fuel for the coal-burning engines. Sometimes they had classical names left by itinerant scholars, and this one was called “Myrna.” The expectant father decided then and there, if the child was a girl, that would be her name.
It took some convincing, though:
When I was born, on August 2nd, there were great battles between him and my mother and grandmother. The ladies wanted Annabel, a composite of my grandmothers’ names, but for once my father held out against the strong women of the family. (…) So they named me Myrna Adele Williams, because my father liked the sound of it.
When she signed with Warner Brothers in the mid-1920s, her surname was changed from Williams to Loy.
Like the names Morna and Murna, the name Myrna is an Anglicized form of the Irish name Muirne.
What are your thoughts on the name Myrna?
Sources:
- Myrna Loy – Wikipedia
- Kotsilibas-Davis, James, and Myrna Loy. Myrna Loy: Being and Becoming. New York: Knopf, 1987.
- SSA
Image: Adapted from Myrna Loy (public domain)
[Latest update: Sept. 2025]