How popular is the baby name Victory 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 Victory.

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Popularity of the baby name Victory


Posts that mention the name Victory

Where did the baby names Foch and Marne come from in 1918?

French military leader Ferdinand Foch (1851-1929)
Ferdinand Foch

The names Marne and Foch and were the top debut names in the U.S. baby name data for girls and boys (respectively) in 1918:

Boys named FochGirls named MarneBoys named Marne
1920.65
19199.6
191858*24*17*
1917...
1916...
*Debut

Foch debuted so impressively in 1918 that it reached the top 1,000 for the first and only time (ranking 874th in 1918).

And Marne didn’t just debut as a girl name — it also debuted as a boy name. In fact, it was the third-highest boy-name debut of 1918, after Foch and Victory.

The Social Security Death Index shows a similar spike in the usage of both names (as first names specifically) that year:

People named Foch (SSDI)People named Marne (SSDI)
1920.10
1919813
19184137
191716
1916.3

So where did these two names come from?

As it turns out, they were inspired by related things.

The Second Battle of the Marne — the last major German offensive of WWI — was fought in the Marne River valley (in northeastern France) over several days in July of 1918. The Allies resisted the attack, then launched a counterattack led by French general Ferdinand Foch — Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies. Soon after, Foch launched the Hundred Days Offensive (August to November), which led to the defeat of Germany and the end of World War I.

The river name Marne is pronounced mahrn (with a guttural R) by French speakers, though I doubt the American babies named for the battle used this pronunciation. (The name saw peak usage in the late 1960s, shadowing the much higher peak of the similar name Marnie.)

The surname Foch is pronounced fosh — like the word “foe” with an sh-sound attached. I spotted several feminized versions of the name (e.g., Focha, Fochette) in the SSDI.

The SSDI also included people with more than one WWI-inspired given name, such as:

  • Foch Pershing Pensis (1918-2011)
  • Marne Pershing Nagle (1918-2010)
  • Victory Foch Havens (1918-1944)
  • Pershing Foch Mills (1918-2008)

What are your thoughts on these names?

Sources: Second Battle of the Marne – Wikipedia, Ferdinand Foch – Wikipedia, SSA, SSDI

Image of Gen. Ferd. Foch. from LOC

[Latest update: 6/2022]

Baby name warning from 1942

Unusual baby names are discussed regularly in the media these days, but I don’t often see the topic come up in old newspapers, which is why I was surprised to find the following in a paper printed in early 1942:

News pictures recently gave publicity to a baby who was born during a practice air-raid blackout and whose mother hit on the expediency of naming her Dawn Siren. Another baby has been named Victory Pearl Harbor.

These names did not impress our anonymous reporter:

Herewith is a brief for all children whose parents give them unusual mirth-provoking or humiliating names. The offending fathers and mothers may be well meaning enough and in some cases the names have significance at the time they are given, but before long the child is hanging his head in shame under the storm of derision of his playmates, or blushing when he gives his name for the roll at school.

Dawn and Victory seem tame nowadays…makes me wonder what this person would have had to say about today’s unusual names.

Speaking of Dawn and Victory, here’s a bit more about them…

  • Dawn Siren was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Lingerman of Buffalo, New York. She was born “in Lafayette General Hospital during Buffalo’s test blackout Friday night.”
  • Victory Pearl Harbor was the son of William and Annie Moore of McComb, Mississippi. In the Social Security Death Index (SSDI), he’s listed simply as “Victor Moore.”

Sources:

Popular and unique baby names in Brussels (Belgium), 2008

Flag of Belgium
Flag of Belgium

In 2007, the most popular names in Brussels (the capital of both Belgium and the European Union) were Lina/Sara (tied) and Mohamed.

These were the city’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names:

Girl names

  1. Lina, 94 baby girls (tie)
  2. Sarah, 94 (tie)
  3. Aya, 86
  4. Yasmine, 71
  5. Rania, 70 (tie)
  6. Sara, 70 (tie)
  7. Salma, 69
  8. Imane, 63
  9. Ines, 56
  10. Clara, 49

Boy names

  1. Mohamed, 235 baby boys
  2. Adam, 169
  3. Rayan, 84
  4. Nathan, 81
  5. Gabriel, 66
  6. Amine, 62
  7. Ayoub, 58 (tie)
  8. Mehdi, 58 (tie)
  9. Lucas, 56
  10. Anas, 54

According to Brussel Nieuws.be, the number of births between 2002 and 2007 rose by 8.4% for boys and 9.2% for girls, but the total number of different names increased by 17.0% and 20.7%, respectively. Very interesting…

And what about the unique names? They included:

Unique boy namesUnique girl names
Adonis, Arafat, Aristote, Aristoteles, Babaloluwa, Beau-Luccio, Blade, Blij, Bonheur, Boy, Broes, C-jay, Christ-Yehochua, Devo, Diesel, Dieumerci, Dike, Doedoe, Elegast, Ensor, Euro, Exaucé, Faithwins, Fox-Anthony, Goodwill, Grimm, Harley-Davidson, Jazz, Jean-Public, Jefken, Joyeux, Kennedy, Kyuss, Lancelot, Lion, Lowie-Viktoor, Maddox, Mekongo-Willy, Mel-Gibson, Merlijn, Moon, Mouhamadousaikou, Mozes, Muhammed-Ali, Odd, Okay, Precieux, Prodige, Quossay, Ridder, Rocco, Serafin, Sky, Spencer-Cash, Stier, Strong, Sufjan, Sunday, Sunny, Synphorien, Thoth, Thörgal, Trésor, Vangelis, Volkan, Vos, Welcome, Wens, WolfAlaska, Allégresse, Babbe, Babel, Babsi, Bambi, Beertje, Believe, Berin, Beste, Bilitis, Blue, Camus-Salomé, Charisma, Choupette, Condoleezza, Cozmo, Creator, December, Destinée, Destiny, Diva, Echo, Elf, Elie-Blue, Ella-Blue, Enola-Jane, Exaucée, Exocée, Ezel, Fidelité, Glorieuse, Glory, Godwill, Hallelujah, Honesty, Harmonie, Ijoux, India-Summer, Joyful, Kadiatoudiallo, Kikie, Lorelei, Lucrecia-Shanice, Luu-Ly, Lux, Mackenzie, Magnificat, Magnolia, Mammelow, Man, Marvelous, Meadow, Melody, Merel, Missie, Missy, Muze, Nanouk, Netje, Pixie, Salvatrice, Santana, Sherilyn-Morissette, Summer, Sun, Sway, Trinity, Venus, Victory, Vlinder, Winter, Zonne

(I believe the above were culled from records covering the entire country, not just Brussels.)

Sources: Algemene Directie Statistiek, Mohamed tops baby name list in Brussels, Belgian Baby Names 2007

Image: Adapted from Flag of Belgium (public domain)

Unusual real name: Queen Quedith Earth

Olympic hurdler Queen Quedith Earth Harrison has two siblings also named Queen. So her mother calls her by one of her middle names, Quedith (pronounced KWEE-dith), which is a combination of “queen” and “Edith” (her grandmother’s name).

In total, she has eight siblings. All the kids were named by their father, who “chose the names based on the traditions of The Nation of Gods and Earths, an offshoot of the Nation of Islam.”

Her five sisters are named Queen Graceful, Queen Zuequal, Muun, Princess Gemisa Wisdom, and Empress. Her three brothers are King Master, Victory, and God Goldin Zig Zag Zig Allah (who goes by “Goldin”).

Source: Harrison eyes Olympic goal, family issues behind her