Fun With SSA Data!

Kerry Howley | February 8, 2005

PJ Doland points to Martin Wattenberg's interactive visualization of the SSA's baby name database, which tracks how trendy your (or your baby's) name has been over the past century.

Comments

PintofStout|2.8.05 @ 4:11PM|#

Wheew! You had me scared there for a minute. I think my eyes started to glaze over.

Matt F|2.8.05 @ 4:16PM|#

Obviously not a comprehensive database - I can't find "Bort."

|2.8.05 @ 4:17PM|#

Wow.

My dad's name, Cletus, wasn't very popular after 1960.

On the other hand nobody was named Jamal until the late 1960's.

There's a whole lotta stuff going on in there.

|2.8.05 @ 4:23PM|#

That is very cool. Confirms what I always suspected: there was a Brian Glut in 1970, which happens to be the year I was born.

|2.8.05 @ 4:29PM|#

It's funny, every name I could type in of my friends and relatives seems to have peaked at around the time they were born. Sheesh, what a bunch of conformists.

Also, it's also interesting to plug in names of celebrities to see what, if any, impact they had on people naming their kids after them. For instance, Elvis seems to be a more popular name now than in the 50's and Dylan? Forget about it. Everyone's naming their kid Dylan now.

|2.8.05 @ 4:34PM|#

I had the 3rd most common name in America during the '70s. Interesting thing about we Jasons is that, unlike the broadly distriubted Michael, people got tired of us after the '70s. Better to burn out than fade away! Or something ...

|2.8.05 @ 4:49PM|#

Jason, we must be about the same age.

In a Western Civ class I had in college, the professor noted that there were 3 Jasons in the 20 person class and commented, "All these Jasons, we're going to get fleeced."

"Fleeced." Get it? Tap tap tap. Is thing on?

|2.8.05 @ 4:51PM|#

""Fleeced." Get it? Tap tap tap. Is thing on?"

Argh! Or not.

Get it ... Arghornot?

The years surrounding 1973 produced some fine comedic talent, if nothing else ...

|2.8.05 @ 5:01PM|#

Big surprise that my own name enjoyed a spike in popularity in 1960s although it was, apparently, even more popular back around 1900.

Also interesting. The name Denzel doesn't pop uuntil about 1990- I wonder why? And its reall funny to type in the current trend names like Payton - people think the are so original.

|2.8.05 @ 5:07PM|#

It's also funny to note the fortunes of names with political implications. Adolph appears to have been a somewhat popular name during the early part of the century, then plummets off the list in the 40's.

Reagan and Kennedy seem to have both skyrocketed in popularity as names in the last twenty years, whereas Clinton peaked in the 80's [what was that due to, the popularity of Parliament?]. As for the current Prez, sorry to say, George seems to have been on a downward slope since 1900 and, not surprising, nobody has ever named their kid Bush.

Matt|2.8.05 @ 5:23PM|#

"Kathryn" (my daughter's name) has an odd showing. Three different spikes in popularity. Owing to what, I don't know. "Cameron" (my son) has only recently begun to get sort of popular. Not a one to be found before 1940, big climbs in both the 80s and 90s.

Interesting diversion.

|2.8.05 @ 5:24PM|#

The political ones are funny. Check out Karl. I'm sure someone somewhere has named their kid Bush. After all, there are even multiple kids named ESPN.

|2.8.05 @ 5:25PM|#

I find the redrawing of the graphs calming, but was remiss to find a distinct lack of Bort.

|2.8.05 @ 5:33PM|#

Here's another pop-culture trend that I noticed awhile back; check out Xander, Willow, and Anya, although, curiously, not Buffy.

Nikos A. Leverenz|2.8.05 @ 5:36PM|#

No Nikos to be found... thankfully. On second thought, that makes me much easier to track...

|2.8.05 @ 5:46PM|#

THIS IS SO ... FREAKIN' ... COOL.

Apparently my parents played it safe. I received my moniker, Stephen, while it was still fairly popular, but past its peak.

I checked, and it appears that names like Gladys and Hortense have gone way out of style. But maybe some contrarian originality-prizers will make them trendy again. Someday, nubile young candy-stripers named Hortense will be working in nursing homes populated by blue-haired dowagers named Heather.

I'm going to share this with all my friends who are planning on having children.

Final free-association thought: Gary Larson once had a "Far Side" cartoon that showed a class photo of a "kindergarten class of 1985." The caption beneath said: "From left to right: Scott, Jennifer, Jennifer, Scott, Jennifer, Jennifer, Scott, Scott, Scott, Miss Linden, Jennifer, Jennifer, Scott, Scott, Scott, Scott, Scott, Jennifer, Scott, Jennifer."

|2.8.05 @ 5:47PM|#

Devin,
That also works for Chandler, Phoebe and Grace. Now someone just needs to do a Neilsen ratings/baby names comparison.

|2.8.05 @ 6:10PM|#

I note that my real name is quite high in the rankings for the 1940s. I was named after a family friend who went to college with my mother. I have always been thankful they did not name me after his cousin, Sydney, who was a roomate of my dads.

|2.8.05 @ 6:15PM|#

Check out Adolph. It had a fairly precipitous drop in about 1940.. wonder why.

|2.8.05 @ 6:40PM|#

George seems to have been on a downward slope since 1900

Except in Kuwait

|2.8.05 @ 7:52PM|#

Both Mostafa and the alternate, but less cool, Mustafa aren't in the top 1000, I feel special.

Of course, it was #3 most common in Egypt in the 70s.

|2.8.05 @ 9:14PM|#

Reagan and Kennedy seem to have both skyrocketed in popularity as names in the last twenty years

Actually it looks like "Kennedy" skyrocketed not because of the president, but when the female MTV VJ of that moniker became popular in the 90s. Which is probably even more pathetic (or not, depending on your POV)...

|2.8.05 @ 9:17PM|#

Type in "ETH" to see perhaps the more striking example of opposite trends at work.

|2.8.05 @ 10:12PM|#

Some random observations:

1) Someone said the name "Adolph" took a sharp decline in the 1940s. The actual situation is a bit more interesting. "Adolph" was already in a sharp decline at the beginning of the 20th century -- but in the 1940s, while the number of babies given that name was already fairly low, the rate of decline actually slowed and then held pretty steady until the 1960s. To me, that suggests that "something" actually gave the name's plummeting popularity a bit of a boost. The name didn't drop into the floor until the 1970s.

2) Check out "Malcolm." A bit of a jump in the 1990s, which I'll bet is directly due to Spike Lee's 1992 movie Malcom X.

3) "Shaniqua" enjoyed a spike in popularity in the 1990s, but was almost never bestowed prior to the 1980s or after the 1990s.

4) Variations of "Mohammed" (use "MOHAM") are on the rise, but nowhere near so much as "Jesus."

5) "Candy" was a very '70s name. "Candi" is a very '80s name.

6) No one names their kid "Dick" anymore, but "Jack" is making a comeback.

7) The popularity of "Clinton," ascendant in the 1970s, took a nosedive in the 1990s. Something similar happened to "Hillary," "Hilary" and, unfair as it may be, "Chelsea."

8) Meanwhile, "Reagan" surged in the 1980s (starting at about zero) and even more so in the 1990s. "Ronald," however, has been in a nosedive since the 1940s, albeit with some leveling off from the 1970s to the present. Ditto for "Ron."

9) Check out "Brigitte" and you'll get a graph that resembles the physical characteristics for which certain women named Brigitte are famous.

10) "Lily" and "Lilly," once dead, are blooming again.

|2.9.05 @ 3:05AM|#

Cool thing... hmmm... what can I point to that hasn't been pointed out already... well, vowell names all seem to be low in the middle, high at either end. Neato.

|2.9.05 @ 11:43AM|#

Actually, on the subject of presidential names, what's fascinating is the decline in influence over the past century. Punch in Woodrow, Warren, Calvin, Franklin, Dwight(!), and Lyndon(!) and check out the placement of the spikes. (John was already in the top 5 in the 1950s, so JFK couldn't have much effect on it. However, it is interesting that Truman had no effect on Harry/Harold.) Yet, after LBJ, presidents no longer produce any spike associated with their names. Indeed, if you check Richard, Gerald, James/Jimmy, Ronald, George, and William/Bill, you'll often find the name *declined* in popularity.

|2.21.05 @ 3:39PM|#

Check out the name Hillary. Such a precipitous decline in the '90s. Yikes!