Satire: Most Popular U.S. Baby Names [for Black, White and Asian students in U.S.]

The Onion ^ | December 25, 2002 issue | The Onion Staff

[TontoKowalski]

Thank you so much for the link. I'm certainly going to explore it. You mentioned that you did some genealogy. How do you track the lineage of black Americans past the 1860's? You use Caesar Jones as an example, but how could you tell who were Caesar's mother and father? This would seem especially hard if the child or a parent were sold off. Did the census keep those kinds of records? I can't imagine that the slaveowners were particularly concerned about recording the bloodlines of the slaves, but I could be wrong there.

Of course, your link may answer my questions, and it would probably serve me better if I were to explore it first, but I'm curious...

[GraniteStateConservative]

This is Antawn Jamison. It's pronounced Ant-wahn. Why is it spelled that way? He admits it's because his Mom couldn't spell and she didn't bother to make sure she spelled her kid's name correctly.

[muggs]

I worked with a woman who is like a sister to me named Margaret, Peg, last name Greene, P. Greene. I started to call her Maggie, she is now Maggs, a load off of her shoulders.

LOL, I wouldn't want to be known as P. Greene either. But Maggs is close to Muggs. You could call her Muggs, but she might not like being named after a monkey, J. Fred Muggs.

[glory]

When I worked in a drug store it was Kools or Newports and every now and then a Salem.

[Clintons Are White Trash]

My moms family had some old fashioned names - Agatha, Mary Emma, Lillian Mathilda (my mom) Gertha and then something strange happened and the last one was named Carol.

The performing arts group I have has 4 Sara's out of 19 girls all in their late teens.

In our family, first names don't matter much when your last name is Bonebrake.

[Erasmus]

LOL....I knew a family who named their daughters: April, May, June, and Julie.

Being a man of software, I like a nice clean organizing principle.

I'd call this 'structured naming,' something you could do with the 'fill series' command on your Family Tree Excel spreadsheet.

[SauronOfMordor]

I used to try to be open minded about some of these names, thinking that maybe they have some roots in African culture

More likely from a desire to have a name that will be likely to be mis-typed as a search query is entered into the police database

[Amelia]

I'm not a professional genealogist, just an avid hobbyist, and I've not tried to trace the lineage of black Americans before 1860, but one way was by deeds such as those on the site, and another was by wills. Sometimes those documents would tell at least who the mother of the children was, and sometimes they identified slaves as man & wife. Church records are another possible source of some information.

Supposedly some of the slave owners kept good plantation books and had better documentation for their slaves than for their own children, but I haven't seen any of those yet. It would make sense that they would keep good records - in many of the probate records I've seen, the value of the slaves was the biggest item in the estate - far surpassing the value of land and other possessions.

[ricpic]

More likely from a desire to have a name that will be likely to be mistyped as a search query is entered into the police database.

---

Naughty naughty. Musn't tell the truth.

[reg45]

and that a child with a name celebrating a Confederate General was just "trash" anyway.

Like Forrest Gump!

[Erasmus]

A touching way to name your newborn.

It reminds me of the old story about the little Native American child and his mother. (Here's hoping people can take a JOKE.)

Kid: "Mommy, how did I get my name?"

Mom: "Well son, among our people, we have a long tradition. When a child is born, the mother looks out of the tepee and the name comes to her from the first thing that she sees. For example, there's your little sister Standing Faun, and your cousin Soaring Eagle.

Why do you ask, Two Dogs -------?"

[Little Bill]

It started as Maggie May, after the song. She is a Savin Hill Broad, their term, eats nails for breakfast.

[reg45]

I just noticed "Newport" as well. If it was triplets, the other two brothers could be named "Salem" and "Kools".

Will they be barred from restaurants in California?

[GraniteStateConservative]

The only way those old names are used is if they aren't used as nicknames. They're actually called "Matthew" and "Daniel" and such rather than "Matt" and "Dan." That way it is a novel name.

[reg45]

now Avery is becoming popular for boys and girls.

I have a box near my computer - how about Avery LaBel?

[ChakaZulu]

Those funny??????????????

[exmoor]

Is that you Crackqua?????????????

[reg45]

Dakota, Montanna, Logan, Brianna, Cameron, Kaylie, Mackenzi, Tiffanie, Caleb, Cheyenne, etc.

Caleb is a perfectly proper Biblical name and very popular among my wife's colonial ancestors.

[FUMETTI]

I like that name, it almost seems like a derivitive of Brenda, another girl's name I always liked.

[FUMETTI]

I have heard of that seemy character, but all names have an embarassing alter ego or bad character. Look at all legitimate people named Charles who had Charles Manson as a fellow first namer...and many German Americans named Adolph in the 1940s changed their first names to anything but that moniker. Michael, my first name, is the first name of that sicko Michael Jackson. I am sure it was him that caused the name to no longer be the most popular name for male children.