Time for the latest batch of name quotes!
From a recent Daily Mail article about an Englishman named Pele Johnson (who was born in September of 1970 — not long after the 1970 World Cup took place in Mexico):
“[M]y whole life has been shaped by the fact that I’m called Pele. Everywhere I’ve gone, it’s always been about my name first.
“It’s never hindered me in my career or anything, it’s a wonderful thing.”
[…]
His father Anthony Johnson wanted to name him after all the forwards and midfield of the Brazilian team in tribute to them winning the Jules Rimet trophy for the third time three months earlier.
It would have made him Pele Jairzinho Tostao Rivelino Clodoaldo Gerson Johnson.
[…]
Instead, the couple compromised on using two of the team’s names, meaning he was christened Pele Jairzinho Johnson.
From the 2004 book I’m a Believer: My Life of Monkees, Music, and Madness by Micky Dolenz:
I have three younger sisters. The oldest of the three is “Coco.” Her real name is Gemma Marie, but somewhere along the line I nicknamed her “Coco Sunshine” and it stuck. I don’t think she has ever forgiven me.
(Micky’s eldest daughter, born in 1969, was named Ami Bluebell.)
From the 1915 article “What’s in a Name?” in Cosmopolitan magazine:
Carroll McComas has done her best to make up to her father, Judge C. C. McComas, for the disappointment she caused him in failing to be born a boy. When he insisted upon going through with his prepared program, notwithstanding her sex, and named her Charles Carroll McComas, her family history records that she dimpled sweetly and never whimpered.
[Stage actress Charles Carroll McComas (1886-1962) and her like-named father were descendants of Charles Carroll, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Her three older sisters were named Helen, Alice, and Clare.]
From a 2013 article about Oklahoma baby names in The Tulsa World:
Jeremiah and Carrie Rosson of Kellyville chose the name Elijah Gust for their 17-month-old because of its biblical roots and because the weather-influenced middle name paired well with their four-year-old son Josiah Thunder’s name.
“There is a verse in the 2 Kings that says Elijah was swept up in a gust,” Jeremiah Rosson said of the inspiration for their younger son’s name.
(Hundreds of baby boys in the U.S. have been named Thunder, btw.)
From the book Radio Shangri-La: What I Discovered on my Accidental Journey to the Happiest Kingdom on Earth (2010) by Lisa Napoli:
If you walked into any village in all of Bhutan and shouted “Karma,” a quarter of the heads would turn. There are only about fifty names in the whole country … There are no familial surnames, and most names are unisex. So it is entirely possible that a family could be made up of a mother named Karma Wangdi and a father named Karma Lhamo, a child named Karma Choden, and another named Lhamo Wangdi.
From the October 2000 Libertad Digital article “El Tribunal de Elecciones de Honduras rechaza los nombres ‘raros’” (translated):
The National Elections Tribunal (TNE) has announced that it will introduce an initiative to the legislature to prohibit the absurd, obscene or grotesque names of people in Honduras. The measure has been taken because in that country the law does not allow Hondurans to change their names.
The president of the TNE, the liberal Lisandro Quezada, has indicated that “the height of the situation is that there are strange names such as Cruz de Cardán, Silvín, Llanta del Milagro, Bujía and Motor Martínez that, without a doubt, cause annoyance to those who owe them take your whole life.”
[Those five names were inspired by automotive parts: Cruz de Cardán means “Cardan cross,” Silvín (created from the English words sealed beam) means “headlamp,” Llanta del Milagro means “miracle tire,” and Bujía means “spark plug.”]
