Related to names thread: Using out of date names
 

Would you give your child a really out of date name, such as Edna for a girl or your maiden name (if you're a woman) to a boy? When I was an undergrad, there was a girl in my dorm named Adelaide (which was interesting, because the dorm attached to mine was called Adelaide Hall)

As long as there can be a nickname for it... or even an unrelated nickname given (ie. girl's name is Belinda, but people call her Suzy.. for some reason, it happens). I love "historic" names. But I think it's kind of mean to call your child that and then force them to be Edna (which is my grandmother's name, and she goes by Sunny!) at age 3.

I don't think so. BUt you know what is funny..I was just having this conversation about how you can date specific names to a specific time period while watching the sound of music and looking at the real life names...funny how often times things like that always come up more then once when you have just thought about them for the first time.

my name is noreen and it is definately an old name. i would not trade my name for anything in the world. i love having a name that no one else has and that makes little old ladies remember their childhood friends named noreen.

It really would depend on the name. Some are so beautiful, while others aren't.
Lots of the older names were biblical and I love them, but a "Hilda" or "Mathilda" doesn't do it for me.

( etahannah, I have a cousin named Coreene and an aunt Irene.)

I used to dislike my name because people would call me Maureen, not that there is anything wrong with that name. I like my name Noreen because I am named after my grandmother Nora. :)

Exactly! Like your original example, Taualumna-- it would just be cruel to name a kid now Edna, or for that matter Gertrude, Ethel, etc. A name like Adelaide is very pretty, though! I wouldn't mind naming my child an older (and probably less-often-used) name if it was one I liked.

I like the name Adelaide...you could call her Addy, for short. :)

While I really love old-fashioned names, I'm sooooooo glad my mom didn't name me after either of my grandmothers...I just don't think I look like an Irene or a Mamie.

There was a girl in my class last semester and her name was Lorraine. To me that's a pretty old name - especially since my grandpa's sister is named that!

I also had another girl in another class that was named Bernadette. TALK about an old name there too! WoW!

Yeah my mom's real name is Thelma. Most people don't know that. She was named after her grandmother..who's name was Lillie Thelma. She was like "Why couldn't they name me Lillie, that's much better."

I think "old" names are very cool. I wish sometimes I had a more unique name instead of one of the most popular names "jennifer"

If I ever have kids, and that is a big if, I will use family names. My family has always been big on using family names, so it only seems right. I will be skipping Beulah and Bertha, though :)

This thread, though, reminds me of a friend of mine from college. She shares her name with her mom and has a family name that has been passed on for generations - Winnie. Her mom never went by Winnie, but rather by her middle name because her name wasn't exactly hip in the seventies. My friend, though, loved her unique name and always went by Winnie. It just goes to show you that it all depends on the time in which you live, as to what names are acceptable. She also plans on naming her daughter, when she has one, Winnie, so the tradition will live on :)

When I meant maiden name, I was referring to boys taking their mother's maiden name as their first name. I went out with a guy once whose first name is Robertson.

That is sooooooooo Southern. I think it is neat. But you aren't gong to see a lot of it around these parts where we have lots of German and Polish descendants. :)

Tippiechick, I am assuming you got the results of your sonogram. :)

33girl,

Yes:) It's a boy... I actually forgot to tell everyone on here:)

My mother's name is Shirley. I know a couple of other "Shirley's" but they are my mom's friends and are in their late 50's to 60's (named after Shirley Temple). I thank the Lord she did not name me this-phewww. My maternal grandmother's name is MaryEvelyn-another old one. I like my other grandmother's name -Virginia-I think that is a very pretty old name.

My friends middle name is her mother's maiden name-Hunt. I think that is kinda cool:). Her family is from Georgia so I guess it is a southern thing.

Interesting. I've never heard of that. I think my hypothetical future son would kill me if I gave him my maiden name as his first name... :p

I think some of the "older" names (Emma, Sophie, etc) are very attractive and distinctive. Others (Edna, Thelma, etc) are just cruel, the kid would get teased.

Then there are the popular names, whatever the hot name is that year, which I think just leads to confusion... there were six Laurens in my 200-member high school class. Some of them went by their last names!

It's kind of rare these days (Robertson is the only person I know who is actually named after his mom. He's 30), but it was apparently really common 100+ years ago. Shirley, for example was a last name. Then it became a boy's name and it's now a girl's name. Mr. Darcy from Jane Austen's book "Pride and Prejudice" is Fitzwilliam Darcy. It's really likely that the elder Mrs. Darcy was a Miss Fitzwilliam.

I like old English/Irish names. I also love the name Katrina, which is old but making a come back.

I like old-fashioned, classic, family names as well. My sister used Emma for their daughter--it was our grandma and BIL's grandma's name.

I don't think I'll be naming any kids after my maiden name, either. I was glad enough to be rid of it after I marred--it's 10 letters long and very German. Once people learned how to pronounce it, though, that's almost all I was known by in college.

This happens in my family quite a lot! There is a John & William in every generation, and the only way to tell them apart is by their mother's maiden names.

I was almost named for my mama - Dixie Lee - but my parents were afraid that I would be stigmatized by anyone who put a racist connotation to the name. I often wonder, "What if...?"

As for the Jennifers & Melissas - they're old names that have enjoyed a recycling. Enjoy the history of it!

The top 10 names of 2003 http://family.msn.com/tool/article.a..._babynames2003

Girls' names
1. Emily
2. Emma
3. Madison
4. Hannah
5. Hailey
6. Sarah
7. Kaitlyn
8. Isabella
9. Olivia
10. Abigail


Boys' names
1. Jacob
2. Aidan
3. Ethan
4. Matthew
5. Nicholas
6. Joshua
7. Ryan
8. Michael
9. Zachary
10. Tyler

These sound pretty old-fashioned to me. My family uses the name Ryan the way TauAlumna described. It is a first name for many children of women who had it as a maiden name.

When we were deciding on names for my two sons -- now aged 9 and 11 yrs old -- I was adamant about using only family names for both the first and middle names. My husband and I knew both times that we were having boys. One name from my father's side that I loved but my husband hated was Alden...it went back many generations. That last one to have it was my great Uncle -- he went by Bud -- LOVE it!!

I read "Beyond Jennifer and Jason" when deciding which family names to use. I wanted names that had positive or no connotations. I did not want to saddle my sons with names that gave them a strike before anyone even met them. I mean, really, some names DO conjure up definite images!

For my oldest son, we named him Carl William...turned out both hubby and I's deceased paternal grandfathers' middle names were Carl! I liked the fact that you could not make a nick name out of it either (e.g. Richard becomes Dick!!!). Ironically, I often call Carl "Carlos" -- and I don't even speak Spanish! Go figure!! William was hubby's deceased paternal grandfather's first name and it was also in my family tree somewhere. There are two other Carl's in his middle school.

Now my second son's name was trickier. We decided to name him after both our dads -- my dad is Robert but my father in law's first name is Clarence which does not exactly conjure up the most positive image! So we used his middle name for Robert's middle name: Charles. I have kept Robert's name as Robert but hubby tries to make him change it to Rob which Robert refuses to do -- he likes being Robert. In his 4th grade class there is another Robert who also only goes by Robert, but in the whole school, there is only one other Robert and he goes by Robbie.

My parents named me (oldest) and my five sisters with names that all began with the letter C!

Cecilia (nickname Cele)
Catherine (Cathy)
Carolyn (Cari)
Constance (Connie)
Claire (Claire)
Christiane (Chris)

I have a friend whose hubby is Todd and all of Todd's five siblings have names that start with T...


:) :)

I like old-fashioned names. It just depends. My name is Susan, and I love it because it's classy but somewhat unusual for a person my age (21). I like a lot of names like that, but not the more "stodgy" ones.

More traditional Names I like:
Millicent
Ada
Nathan

there are more, I'm sure.

I read a lot of Anne Perry's Charlotte and Thomas Pitt mysteries that are set in the 1880s and 1890s. (She also writes the William Monk novels set in 1850s and 1860s). In reading those books, I see there are characters that have archaic names. I recently finished reading Brunswick Gardens which had a young woman named Tryphena :eek:!

If I have children, I would give them classic names. However, it won't be those that would get them beat up or teased in school.

http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/.../corkysm60.gif

My roommate sophomore year was named Edna. When I first heard her name, I have to say that I was amused at it!

I think that's correct -- Mr. Darcy had a cousin Colonel Fitzwilliam. I've read that book waaaaaaaaay too much. :D

I'm quite glad that I'm not named after my grandmothers ... I can't really see myself as a "Mary Frances" or a "Hilda Juanita"... especially Hilda. I don't think my grandma likes that name either.

I am a Ginger. My friend in high school's name is Lois Ann. Old fashioned, but cute I thought.

I had a great aunt who's name was Octavian or something like that but they called her Tavie. I think that name is soo cute.

Does she wrestle lions in a colliseum?

-Rudey

Hey, another Ginger! How cool!

(sorry for the hijack.. but you don't find many Ginger's around!!)

My sister and I have nice Biblical names...Rachel (me) and Rebecca. They've kind of maintained popularity so they are older names that don't sound "old." (My middle name is Irene...that isn't old!)

I was born in the 70s and it seemed like every third girl in school was named Jennifer. When I competed in my local Junior Miss program, out of sixteen contestants, four were named Jennifer. No wonder that name isn't so popular for babies now. heh.

Hootie: I went to school (grade school-high school) with a Lorraine. So that name doesn't seem super old to me. :)

I would never name my kids things like Gertrude or Ethel or Edna or Bertha. Nor would I name them things like Makayla or Mackenzie or anything like that either.

its so weird to see someone else with my name. i guess cause it is MY name and no one around where i live has it! hehe...

***dances a possessive name dance***

I know! It's weird for me, too. There are two other women in NYC that I know of with my name, first and last. That's even weirder, if weirder is a word, lol!

The African Grey parrot that we have can say our cool name. It is so funny!

I like my name...Jadey. I've never met anyone with the same name, except for a few people's who go by J.D. I will name my children something unique because that's what I'm used to. My brother is Maxxwell (Max for short) and my mom spells her name differently, Robyn. My dad's name isn't too original though. And my boyfriend has a unique name also, so if we get married, our children will have to fit in with the cool names! :D

Isn't Rebecca in the Bible as Rebekah?

True. We are a rarety. I like it thought. I wouldn't want to be named anything else. Ginger fits me.

Sorry for the triple post. I love this name...I knew a girl who spelled it Jaydee. Cute.

I find it highly amusing some of these names are those of my female relatives. Both my grandmothers went by their middle names. One was Mabel Lorraine, and the other was Mary Katherine. Katherine had other Marys in the family so it made sense, and well Lorraine, that is somewhat self explanatory. My mother ended up Adah Lorraine. On my father's side the men had been named Richard Otto one generation, and then Otto Richard the next. My father lucked out and ended up Richard Emerson (yes we're related to the writer).

My sister ended up named after my mother's college roommate, Janice. Of course instead of JaNICE I call her JaNASTY when she is being mean. Since I was blessed being Anne Caroline my sister likes to say mom listened to too much Neill Diamond in the 70's thus 'Sweet Caroline", and she dug Raggedy Anne. And people wonder why I call her JaNASTY. Mother says I am named after classy, independent, intelligent, strong-willed princesses (namely of the British empire and Monaco).

I have a step brother and sister that have the same middle name which is from their mother's side. I didn't realize the name was important to the history of Tucson and Arizona, beyond a country singer from there.

I knew a couple who wanted to name their daughter a biblical name, but couldn't find one they liked, so they named her "Jacee" as in J.C.

Pretty creative, I thought...

people who suck at picking out names should not be allowed to have kids