Elizabeth, Catherine, Frances, Mary; are they underused now?

[Anonymous]

Eloise
Eileen
Margaret (nn - Greta, Meg, Meggie)

In my child's kindergarten class: there are none of the names in your list - except Claire.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only Marys I know born in the last 50 years have come from VERY religious Catholic families--like the ones with 10+ kids who go to mass every morning, not just Sundays. If you name your daughter Mary people will assume you are an extremely conservative Catholic.

We have a Mary, we're Christmas and Easter Episcopalians. The other two Mary's I know are also WASPS. Anecdotal isn't data.

[Anonymous]

I think Mary is cute and not over used. It’s a biblical name sure, but so are a lot of names.

[Anonymous]

Eloise and Louisa were both on our short list (along with Daphne and Diana), but we went with Elizabeth. Evelyn was also on our list but it’s really popping right now- Elizabeth is perennially popular, which actually makes it less “trendy” or likely to be dated IMhO. If you meet an Evelyn in 20 years you will know she was born 2015-2020, in the same way Linda was born in like ‘65 and Sarah was born in ‘82.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Eloise and Louisa were both on our short list (along with Daphne and Diana), but we went with Elizabeth. Evelyn was also on our list but it’s really popping right now- Elizabeth is perennially popular, which actually makes it less “trendy” or likely to be dated IMhO. If you meet an Evelyn in 20 years you will know she was born 2015-2020, in the same way Linda was born in like ‘65 and Sarah was born in ‘82.

Actually peak Sarah was 1993, and it was in the top 10 between 1978 and 2002. So no, you wouldn't know that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they are all beautiful names and you couldn’t go wrong with any of them. But if your goal is to guarantee that your daughter will be the only one in her social circle with the name, none of those will get you there. I have a 2 and 4 year old in NOVA and I know at least one child in my kids’ social circles with each of those names. Caroline is probably the most used one out of those.

OP here, not my goal. I grew up in the Ashley, Megan, Katie, Maddie, Jessica generation, so I'd prefer if it wasn't popular to the degree of those names. I have a commonish name, but I don't know a lot of people with it.

The most popular girl name in this decade is about a quarter as popular as the most popular girl name of the 70s. Translation: if it's not a top 10 name, your child is unlikely to have classmates with the same name and even a top 100 name you will meet only a handful of age-mates with the same name.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
The only Marys I know born in the last 50 years have come from VERY religious Catholic families--like the ones with 10+ kids who go to mass every morning, not just Sundays. If you name your daughter Mary people will assume you are an extremely conservative Catholic.

You don't get out much, do you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In Washington, D.C.:

#3 Elizabeth
#30 Caroline
#35 Clara
#40 Julia
#49 Catherine
#54 Mary
#60 Frances

not in top 100: Elise

(https://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/namesbystate.cgi)

I think you need to look not just at high rank but "change in rank" so you can stray away from what is trendy (ie popular now but wont be popular once it fades) and recognize what is classic (ranked high, always been high, likely to continue to rank high).

For example, two names I hear ALL the time now that are super trendy are Penelope (2018 = 26) and Harper (2018 = 9). Penelope is a name that has been ranked since the 1922 and average rank is somewhere in the 400s and it was as low as 941 in 2001 but is currently experiencing a super high raking. Harper is a name that wasnt ranked (didnt exist) until 2004 when it was 884 and since then has ranked 11th or higher since 2014.

From your list Clara and Frances are similar to Penelope: long time ranked names that are experiencing a recent uptick but much less dramatically than trendy Penelope (didnt fall as far, never rose as high). Elizabeth, Caroline, Julia Catherine (+Katherine) and Mary are highly ranked names that are perennially high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only Marys I know born in the last 50 years have come from VERY religious Catholic families--like the ones with 10+ kids who go to mass every morning, not just Sundays. If you name your daughter Mary people will assume you are an extremely conservative Catholic.

The Mary I know is Protestant.

[Anonymous]

DD is a Mary - not Mary Something - just Mary. And she’s always been the only Mary in her schools (NYC, Austria and here). We are atheists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would suggest Evelyn for a classic name. And I would personally use Evelyn but Evie is a great nickname.

very popular name btw

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In Washington, D.C.:

#3 Elizabeth
#30 Caroline
#35 Clara
#40 Julia
#49 Catherine
#54 Mary
#60 Frances

not in top 100: Elise

(https://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/namesbystate.cgi)

From someone about to name a baby who has been combing the SSA lists I did not know about this search filter, thank you!!!

OP here, I went through those lists. But for Maryland, I don't understand why names like Genesis, Skylar, Nova, and straight Bella (not Isabella) are more popular than Caroline, when everyone is saying that Caroline is the most overused name ever.

There is a very wide variety of social and ethnic and racial groups in Maryland. Caroline is totally overused amongst white, UMC girls. Believe me.

[Anonymous]

Felicity or Constance? Classic, but not currently trendy.

[Anonymous]

Virginia
Pauline
Viola
Georgia
Lilian
Jacqueline
Lucinda
Alberta
Flora
Nina
Matilda
Augusta
Marjorie
Ramona
Claudia
Ariel
Clarissa
Dorinda
Lavinia

[Anonymous]

Sarah
Laura
Josephine

I love Mary and have a sister with the same but I come from a catholic fam with like 10 kids and catholic school for 13 yrs. I don’t care that people associate the name with Catholicism but it might not be a choice at all if I were jewish