How popular is the baby name Virginia 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 Virginia.

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Popularity of the baby name Virginia


Posts that mention the name Virginia

What gave the baby name Dagmar a boost in 1951?

TV personality Dagmar (1921-2001)
Dagmar

The name Dagmar (based on the Old Norse words dagr, meaning “day,” and mær, meaning “maid”) peaked in usage in the mid-1910s. But it returned for a secondary peak in 1951:

  • 1953: 16 baby girls named Dagmar
  • 1952: 21 baby girls named Dagmar
  • 1951: 28 baby girls named Dagmar
  • 1950: 18 baby girls named Dagmar
  • 1949: 15 baby girls named Dagmar

What gave it a boost that particular year?

An American actress known simply as Dagmar. She became one of television’s first stars — and its very first sex symbol — in 1951.

She was born Virginia Ruth Egnor in West Virginia in 1921. When she began modeling and acting in the 1940s, she adopted the stage name “Jennie Lewis.”

But that stage name was changed to “Dagmar” when she was hired to appear on NBC’s Broadway Open House (1950–51), which was the first late-night variety show on network television. The bosomy* actress was instructed by the show’s host, Jerry Lester, to “act dumb” on the air. Justin Peters of Slate described the Dagmar segments of Broadway Open House as “gleefully sexist and unfunny, yet somehow redeemed by Dagmar’s odd, icy sense of dignity.”

Dagmar soon became more popular than the host himself. Lester ended up quitting, and Dagmar hosted the show during its final month on the air.

Around the same time, she began appearing on other TV variety shows (like Texaco Star Theater and the Bob Hope Show). She even landed on the the cover of Life magazine.

What are your thoughts on the name Dagmar? Would you use it for a modern-day baby?

*Fun fact: The two conical front bumper guards of various ’50s Cadillacs (and other GM cars) — originally modeled after artillery shells — came to be known as “Dagmar bumpers” or simply “Dagmars” in reference to the actress.

Sources:

Image: Clipping from the cover of Life magazine (16 Jul. 1951)

The 11 siblings of Audie Murphy

Audie Murphy and sister Nadine
Audie Murphy and sister Nadine

Did you know that Audie Murphy — the soldier-turned-actor mentioned in yesterday’s post on Destry — was one of a dozen siblings? All 12 of the Murphy children were born in Texas. Here are their first and middle names:

  1. Elizabeth Corine, b. 1910
  2. Charles Emmett, b. 1912
  3. Vernon C., b. 1916
  4. Ariel June, b. 1919
  5. Virginia Oneta, b. 1918
  6. J.W. (stillborn), b. 1920
  7. Audie Leon, b. 1925
  8. Richard Houston, b. 1926
  9. Eugene Porter, b. 1928
  10. Reta Fay, b. 1931 – later known as Verda Nadine (see pic)
  11. Willa Beatrice, b. 1933
  12. Joe Preston, b. 1935

Which of these combinations do you like best?

Sources:

Image: Clipping from Life magazine (16 Jul. 1945)

North Carolina family with 16 children

kinderfest

Jonathan Jasper “Jack” Sullivan married Bertha Phillips in early 1909. The North Carolina farm couple went on to have sixteen children — nine sons and seven daughters. Their names, in order, were…

  1. Cretta (born in 1910)
  2. Leland (1912)
  3. Rosa (1913)
  4. Woodrow (1916)
  5. Wilmar (1918)
  6. Joseph (1919)
  7. Dorothy (1921)
  8. Virginia (1923)
  9. Irving (1924)
  10. Blanche (1925)
  11. C.D. (1927)
  12. Geraldine (1928)
  13. Marverine (1930)
  14. Billy (1932)
  15. Tom (1934)
  16. Gene (1938)

Here’s more about Gene’s name:

Gene Autry Sullivan, the youngest of the children and the one who organizes the [family] reunion each year, said he was told he was named after legendary cowboy movie star Gene Autry “because his parents had run out of names by then.”

(The Sierra post includes a photo of Gene Autry.)

Source: Barnes, Keith. “The Sullivan family’s 16 children.” Wilson Times [North Carolina] 29 Aug. 2018.

Image: Ein Kinderfest (1868) by Ludwig Knaus

Why did Christopher debut as a girl name in 1938?

Actor Orson Welles, his first wife Virginia, and their baby girl Christopher (in 1938)
Orson Welles, Virginia, and baby girl Christopher

Legendary actor Orson Welles was married three times and had one daughter per marriage. The last two daughters had conventional names (Rebecca and Beatrice), but the first had an unexpected name: Christopher.

On the day Christopher Welles arrived in March of 1938, her father sent out a short telegram that read: “CHRISTOPHER SHE IS HERE.”

(When Christopher questioned her father about the name as a child, he replied: “Your name has a marvelous ring to it, don’t you think?” He added that she was “the only girl in the world” called Christopher, which made her unique.)

The year Christopher Welles was born, the name Christopher appeared as a girl name for the first time in the U.S. baby name data:

Boys named ChristopherGirls named Christopher
19405007
19393595
19383088*
1937294.
1936277.
*Debut (gender-specific)

My hunch is that Orson Welles’s daughter was the main influence behind the debut. That said, the name Christopher was on the rise (as a boy name) in the late ’30s, so it’s possible that some of these female Christophers were simply mis-coded male Christophers.

As it turns out, Christopher Welles disliked her name: “I was teased mercilessly in school and was quite miserable as a result. I wanted to change it to Linda.” As an adult, she went by the shortened form Chris.

The name Christopher was in the top 10 for boys from 1967 to 2009, ranking #2 for many years from the ’70s to the ’90s. But it also ended up in the girls’ top 1,000 for 24 years, from 1967 to 1990.

What are your thoughts on Christopher as a girl name?

Sources:

Image: Orson, Virginia, and Christopher Welles (1938)

[Latest update: Aug. 2023]