What gave the baby name Marylou a boost in 1927?

Abe Lyman's California Orchestra single "Mary Lou" (1926)
“Mary Lou” recording

The baby name Marylou was on the rise in the 1920s, but usage increased sharply for a couple of years in the middle of the decade:

  • 1929: 183 baby girls named Marylou [rank: 498th]
  • 1928: 183 baby girls named Marylou [rank: 512th]
  • 1927: 281 baby girls named Marylou [rank: 410th]
  • 1926: 146 baby girls named Marylou [rank: 588th]
  • 1925: 82 baby girls named Marylou [rank: 824th]

Here’s the popularity graph:

Graph of the usage of the baby name Marylou in the United States since 1880
Usage of the baby name Marylou

Why?

Because of the song “Mary Lou,” which was composed in early 1926 by Abe Lyman, George Waggner, and J. Russel Robinson.

The first recording of the song was released by Abe Lyman’s own California Orchestra.

Recordings by other orchestras soon followed. They were released during the remainder of 1926 and into early 1927.

The song became a hit for both Abe Lyman and the Ipana Troubadours, whose version was released in October of 1926. (The Troubadours had a radio show sponsored by Ipana Toothpaste, hence their name.)

Here’s the song:

(The company that published Abe Lyman’s rendition of the song, Brunswick Records, often included Spanish-language translations of song titles on their record labels. For name-title “Mary Lou,” they chose the translation “Maria Luisa.”)

Here’s a snippet of the lyrics (which seem to reference an upcoming wedding):

Why for miles around they’re waiting, to start their celebrating,
when you say “I do,” Mary Lou!

A baby girl born in Kentucky in early 1927 was given the radio-crowdsourced name Seroba Mary Lou Bartley. I still don’t know quite where Seroba came from, but it’s probable that Mary Lou was suggested by radio listeners familiar with the trendy song “Mary Lou.”

Sources:

What brought the baby name Theodosia back in 2016?

Image from "Hamilton" Broadway poster
Poster for “Hamilton“

The old-fashioned name Theodosia, which dropped out of the U.S. baby name data after 2006, popped back up again a decade later:

  • 2018: 11 baby girls named Theodosia
  • 2017: 11 baby girls named Theodosia
  • 2016: 6 baby girls named Theodosia
  • 2015: unlisted
  • 2014: unlisted

The fact that name Hamilton saw overall peak usage the same year leads me to believe that the influence in both cases was the hip-hop musical Hamilton, by actor/playwright/composer Lin-Manuel Miranda.

The massively popular show opened off-Broadway in early 2015, moved to Broadway mid-year, and ended up winning 11 statuettes at the Tony Awards in mid-2016.

The musical portrayed Alexander Hamilton, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, as he grew “[f]rom bastard orphan to Washington’s right hand man, rebel to war hero, [and] loving husband caught in the country’s first sex scandal to Treasury head who made an untrusting world believe in the American economy.”

One of Hamilton‘s memorable songs, “Dear Theodosia” (pronounced thee-uh-DOH-zhuh), was a touching ballad performed by the characters Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton for their newborn children, Theodosia and Philip.

Here’s the song:

The lyrics begin:

Dear Theodosia, what to say to you?
You have my eyes, you have your mother’s name.

Young Theodosia Burr was indeed named after her mother, Theodosia Bartow, who was, in turn, named after her father, Theodosius Bartow. Their shared name can be traced back to the ancient Greek words theos, meaning “god,” and dosis, meaning “a giving.” (Interestingly, dosis is the root of the modern word dose, which refers to an amount of medicine taken at one time.)

What are your thoughts on the name Theodosia? Would you use it? (How about Hamilton?)

Sources: Dear Theodosia – Genius, Dear Theodosia – Wikipedia, Hamilton (musical) – Wikipedia, Hamilton – Playbill, Lin-Manuel Miranda – Britannica, Behind the Name, SSA

Babies named for Theodosia Burr

American socialite Theodosia Burr (1783-1813)
Theodosia Burr

We’ve all heard of early American politician Aaron Burr, but not as many of us know about his daughter, Theodosia — a well-educated socialite whose mysterious disappearance in early 1813 kept Americans intrigued for decades.

On the last day of 1812, 29-year-old Theodosia set sail from South Carolina (where she lived with her husband, Joseph Alston, the newly elected governor) to New York, to visit her father.

She was never seen again.

Presumably her ship was wrecked in a storm off Cape Hatteras, and all aboard were lost at sea.

No one knew for sure, though, and this left room for a number of alternative theories (many of which involved pirates).

These theories were printed and re-printed in the newspapers and other publications for decades to come. For instance, the following illustration of Theodosia being forced to walk the plank (by pirates, of course) was published in a California newspaper in 1906 — almost a century after her disappearance.

Theodosia walking the plank

Thanks to these recurring stories, dozens (possibly hundreds?) of baby girls were named “Theodosia Burr” during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Some examples…

Her most famous namesake was Theodosia Burr Goodman, born in Ohio in 1885, who went on to become silent film actress Theda Bara.

Sources:

Top image: Theodosia Burr (Mrs. Joseph Alston)

Babies named for Aaron Burr

U.S. politician Aaron Burr (1756-1836)
Aaron Burr

Killing Alexander Hamilton in a duel in July of 1804 may have effectively ended Aaron Burr’s political career, but it didn’t dissuade American parents from continuing to name their baby boys “Aaron Burr.” (Which sounds best when said with a mouth full of peanut butter, of course.)

Of the dozens of Burr namesakes I spotted in the records, a handful were born as early as the 1790s, while Burr was representing the state of New York in the U.S. Senate. But most came along in the 1800s, either while Burr was serving as U.S. Vice President (1801-1805) under Thomas Jefferson or in the years that followed.

Some examples:

Incidentally, I didn’t spot any namesakes from 1804 specifically…

Sources: Aaron Burr – Wikipedia, Find a Grave, FamilySearch, A Chinese Slave in Alexandria? – Immigration in the U.S. South