Name quotes #117: Carroll, Sydney, Tosca

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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 Mickey 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.

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 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.”]

From a 2017 Cricket Australia article about Trinidadian cricket player Brian Lara:

“So special did Lara consider his inaugural Test hundred [at Sydney Cricket Ground in Sydney, Australia, in early 1993] … [that] when his first daughter was born in 1996 she was christened Sydney. And following a visit to the venue that inspired her naming with her famous father in 2016, she now holds honorary membership at the SCG.”

Finally, here’s what Sports Illustrated learned from Maye Musk last year about the names of the Musk children:

  • Elon (b. 1971) “was named after his mother’s grandfather, John Elon Haldeman.”
  • Kimbal (b. 1972) “was named after the book titled Kim by Nobel Prize-winning author Rudyard Kipling.”
    • During his 2018 Reddit AMA, Kimbal said: “My name means Warrior Chief. It is the name of an english orphan in Rudyard Kipling’s book called Kim (short for Kimball). My parents mispelled [sic] my name on my birth certificate, so I’m Kimbal, not ‘Kimball’.”
  • Tosca (b. 1974) “was named after a girl that Musk’s ex-husband [Errol] had a crush on in high school.”
    • Maye noted: “I didn’t care. I thought the name was pretty. And I liked it and it suited her.”

For more quotes about names, check out the name quotes category.

Name quotes #116: Troy, Rowdy, Kendrick

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From a recent Anaheim Ducks video-tweet in which former football player Troy Aikman addressed his namesake, hockey player Troy Terry (b. 1997):

How cool are we to have the name Troy, first of all. Now I know why your parents named you Troy, so it makes me feel really proud. But what makes me feel even prouder is the fact that the Ducks organization has given me the honor to let you know that, for the second consecutive year, you my friend are an NHL All-Star.

From a recent Palladium-Time article about 19th-century medical doctor Algernon Sidney Coe:

Born on a farm on Sept. 18, 1828, in Norway, New York, Algernon Sidney Coe defied all expectations to become a respected and admired physician in Oswego City.

Coe, the son of Ira Coe, a War of 1812 veteran, and Elizabeth Norton, was named after Algernon Sidney who was executed in 1683 in England for his outspoken views on freedom of speech. Sidney was considered a martyr by American thinkers such as Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.

From a recent Miami Herald article about high school football player Rowdy Beers:

There’s buzz about Beers at FIU [Florida International University].

The buzz started when Panthers coach Mike MacIntyre announced on Dec. 21 that FIU had signed the player with “the best name in college football.”

That would be 6-5, 225-pound tight end and Colorado native Rowdy Beers, who is from Littleton, which is nine miles south. of downtown Denver.

[…]

“As a kid,” Beers said, “any time I told my name to a new authority figure, they thought I was being disrespectful.”

[…]

Beers, who was named after three-time Olympic gold-medalist swimmer Rowdy Gaines, had right shoulder surgery on Dec. 29 but is expected to be ready by mid-May.

(Rowdy Beers also has three R-named siblings: Rocky, Raegan, and Rylie. Rowdy Gaines, however, is only nicknamed “Rowdy.” He was born Ambrose Gaines IV in 1959 — the year the baby name Rowdy debuted in the U.S. baby name data thanks to Rawhide.)

From a recent Marshall Tucker Band IG post regarding the death of the band’s namesake, Marshall Tucker:

Our band’s namesake, Mr. Marshall Tucker, passed away peacefully yesterday morning at the age of 99. Though he was never a member of our band, we wouldn’t be here today without his historic name. In the early days when we were rehearsing in an old warehouse in Spartanburg, we found a keychain inscribed with his name. We needed a name asap… and the rest is history! Marshall was blind since birth but amazingly could play the heck out of the piano. He always said his talent was simply God-given. He tuned pianos in South Carolina for decades.

(The story behind Super Mario’s name, in Name quotes #111, also happens to involve a warehouse.)

From a 2013 article about Kendrick Lamar in hip hop magazine XXL:

Amongst the many topics discussed when Kendrick Lamar strolled through Arsenio Hall‘s reinvented television series, the Compton rapper revealed that he’s named after one of the members of the iconic Motown group, the Temptations. While gushing over old school music, K Dot unveiled that his mother named him after Eddie Kendricks, the group’s distinctive falsetto singer.

For more quotes about names, check out the name quotes category.

Name quotes #115: Keyden, Yizhar, Herbert

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To kick off the new year, let’s check out a new batch of name quotes!

First, the story behind Edson — the birth name of late soccer legend Pelé — from the book Why Soccer Matters (2015):

When Dondinho met my mother, Celeste, he was still performing his mandatory military service. She was in school at the time. They married when she was just fifteen; by sixteen she was pregnant with me. They gave me the name “Edson” — after Thomas Edison, because when I was born in 1940, the electric lightbulb had only recently come to their town. They were so impressed that they wanted to pay homage to its inventor. It turned out they missed a letter — but I’ve always loved the name anyway.

(“Dondinho” was the nickname of Pelé’s father, João Ramos do Nascimento.)

…and, regarding the nickname Pelé:

Growing up, I hated that damn nickname. After all, it was a garbage word that meant nothing. Plus, I was really proud of the name Edson, believing it was an honor to be named after such an important inventor.

(The nickname did come in handy, though. He “started thinking of “Pelé” almost as a separate identity” in order to cope with his sudden celebrity. “Having Pelé around helped keep Edson sane,” he said.)

From an article in The Catholic Standard about students at a Maryland high school (found via Abby):

Keyvar Smith-Herold of the class of 2022 at DeMatha Catholic High School smiled as he explained the inspiration for his name, noting that his father Vincent Smith works as a locksmith.

“That’s why ‘Key’ is in our names,” he said, shedding light on the origin of his first name and that of his twin sister, Keydra, and also their older brother Keyden, a 2018 DeMatha graduate.

From the book The Gender Challenge of Hebrew (2015) by Malka Muchnik:

Most Hebrew proper names, especially those used in recent decades, consist of existing words and therefore have specific meanings. This fact helps us see the ideas associated with male or female names, and serves as evidence of what is expected of them.

(The author listed several female names associated with flowers and gemstones — such as Rekefet, meaning “cyclamen,” and Bareket, meaning “agate” — then continued…)

Even more suggestive are female names denoting personal qualities, such as Yaffa (‘pretty’), Tova (‘good’), Aliza (‘joyful’), Adina (‘delicate’), Ahuva (‘beloved’), Metuka (‘sweet’) and Tmima (‘innocent’).

[…]

As opposed to them, we find male names which have the form of a future verb, and from this we can infer the expectations from them: Yakim (‘he will establish’), Yarim (‘he will raise’), Yaniv (‘he will produce’), Yariv (‘he will fight’), Yiftax (‘he will open’), Yig’al (‘he will redeem’), Yisgav (‘he will be great’) and Yizhar (‘he will shine’).

A name story from the recent Washington Post article “Playing the name game” by John Kelly:

Aleta Embrey’s older brother loves to say that her name came from the funny papers. And it did, specifically “Prince Valiant in the Days of King Arthur,” which still runs in The Washington Post.

“Queen Aleta of the Misty Isles is a major figure in the comic strip,” Aleta wrote. “My dad liked the name.”

It is a lovely name, much better than being named, say, “Olive Oyl.”

From Kenneth Whyte’s book Hoover: An Extraordinary Life in Extraordinary Times (2017), which describes the naming of Herbert Hoover (who was born in 1874 to Quaker parents Jesse and Hulda Hoover):

Hulda had shown [her sister] Agnes a bureau drawer full of handmade clothes prepared for the baby, all of them suited for a girl, to be named Laura. Several decades later Agnes recalled that the newborn, a boy, was “round and plump and looked about very cordial at every body.”

Naming the child was a problem as Laura, obviously, would not do, and the mother had no alternative in mind. Another sister reminded Hulda of a favorite book, Pierre and His Family, a Sunday school martyrology set among the Protestant Waldenses of Piedmont. The hero of the story is a spirited boy named Hubert who is dedicated to his Bible and longs to become a pastor. Hulda’s sister remembered Hubert as Herbert, and the baby was called Herbert Clark Hoover. He shared his father’s middle name.

(Discovered via a Midwest National Parks Instagram post.)

And, finally, a line from a New York Post story about a baby born during an overseas flight in December:

Tamara ended up naming the baby Maximiliano, after one of the helpful passengers who was by her side to make sure she had a safe delivery.

For more quotes about names, check out the name quotes category.

Name quotes #114: Aubrey, Stamford, Kyuss

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Here’s a batch of quotes for the final month of 2022!

From an article about Dutch soccer player Denzel Dumfries, who helped the Netherlands knock the U.S. out of the World Cup tournament over the weekend:

[Denzel Dumfries] was named after none other than no-nonsense movie icon Denzel Washington, star of films such as “Remember The Titans,” “Training Day” and “Courage Under Fire.”

“I don’t have [any] connection with the United States, but, yes, I was named after Denzel Washington,” Dumfries said. “My parents gave me that name. I am incredibly proud of it, because Denzel Washington is a really strong personality who voices his views on certain issues, and I am incredibly proud to be named after someone like that.”

From an interview with Australian surfer Kyuss King in Stab Magazine:

Yeah, music is definitely a massive part of my life, from listening to it to playing it! And metal is 100% at the top of my genre — there’s nothing like headbanging to some chunky riffs. Yeah, I was named after the band Kyuss. It was my dad’s favorite band through the ’90s. Funny story, my dad actually had the song Green Machine blasting in the hospital while my mum was in labor with me haha. I guess I kinda came into the world to that kind of music.

From an article about political candidate Krystal Ball, who was asked about her name while campaigning in 2010:

The answer: Her father has a doctorate in physics and did his dissertation on crystals.

So after her mother named older sisters Heidi and Holly, it was dad’s turn.

Ball said she doesn’t mind the questions, though, or the jokes.

And she’ll certainly be hoping a lot of people remember that name now that she’s running for Congress.

A name-change story (contributed by a Missouri woman named Nancy) from a Washington Post article about changing babies’ names:

We named our daughter Joan because we imagined that she would be serious and studious, and this name seemed to encapsulate the proverbial bookworm. Both my husband and I are academicians, so a bookworm daughter didn’t seem a stretch.

[…]

Within the first six weeks, Joan proved not only to be a lusty eater but a very social and cuddly baby who loved long warm baths, in other words, a hedonist in the making.

One night, the credits for Masterpiece Theater were playing and the name of Aubrey rolled across the screen, which happened to be the title of one of our favorite songs from high school. My husband and I looked at each other and simultaneously said, “She’s an Aubrey.” We submitted the paperwork for her name change the next day.

[This source also made an appearance in quotes #112.]

Two highlights from a recent study of American Jewish names by Sarah Bunin Benor and Alicia B. Chandler. The first:

Over the decades, American Jews became more and more likely to give their children names of Jewish origin (English or Hebrew Biblical, Modern Hebrew, etc.), with a major uptick after the 1960s. 14% of Jews in the oldest age group have names of Jewish origin, compared to 63% in the youngest group. The top 10 names for Jewish girls and boys in each decade reflect these changes, such as Ellen and Robert in the 1950s, Rebecca and Joshua in the 1970s, and Noa and Ari in the 2010s.

…and the second:

Jews with distinctively Jewish names are much more likely to sometimes use a “Starbucks name” than Jews with names that are not distinctively Jewish. But some Jews with common American names take on a more Jewish name as their Starbucks name, and some have an “Aroma name” for service encounters in Israel.

From a Yahoo News UK article about a mother and son named Chelsea and Stamford after the football club and the club’s stadium, respectively:

Football fanatic Chelsea Bottomley, 32, an administrator from Paddington, London, said she hopes more blind football games will be made available for her son Stamford.

[…]

Named after the London club’s Stamford Bridge stadium, Stamford has cerebral palsy which, according to the NHS, affects movement and coordination — and impaired vision is common for children with the lifelong condition.

[…]

She added: “My mum had named me Chelsea after the club and, when my boy was born, my mum was such a strong support for me that I named him Stamford for her.”

And, finally, a line from a New York Post story about a baby born aboard an airplane in September:

Skylen Kavon-Air Francis, who was named after his airborne arrival, was carried off the plane as everyone clapped and welcomed the new passenger.

For more quotes about names, check out the name quotes category.