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Baby Names? Vintage?

Darhling

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,517
Location
Norwich, RAF County!
most in my family has these amazing names & middle names - used by generations and generations on both sides on the family, then along comes me and I am given a non-family name that when initialed, people think I am a chocolate (M.M.), and each name rimes with alcoholic drinks or other names for alcohol, so that was very 'funny' in school. I would much rather be named something much more exotic.. :D

the trend for using 'old' names has definitly been around here for some years now.
 

i_am_the_scruff

A-List Customer
Messages
365
Location
England.
fishmeok said:
ARRGH- I married one of you people, it's hard not to in Minnesota.;) My wife is 2nd generation Minnesota Norwegian farmer, though she grew up in the city. Had Lefsa for the first time a few years ago, potato tortillas make no sense to a nice French-Canadian boy like me...

We are currently trying to find a name for the new boy arriving this October. We have a bunch of family names, which is the way I want to go, but nothing we are happy with. These include Selmer, Selvin, Eugene, Floyd, Archer, Clarence, Abraham (provided some of land for the fist Lutheran Church in little Canada, now part of St Paul), Anders, Louis, Eustache (emigrated to French Canada in 1640), Modeste etc...

I kind of like Sidney, but people tell me it's a girls name these days.[huh]

Cheers
Mark

It's a unisex name. And as long as you like it then that's all that matters :)
 

LizzieMaine

Bartender
Messages
33,715
Location
Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
The only Sidney I've ever known was very much a male -- a grizzled, one-eyed grocer who carried a spare glass eye around in his apron pocket and would unveil it at key moments to frighten children away from loitering at the funnybook rack. As I say, *very much* a male.
 

Rufus

Practically Family
Messages
518
Location
London
Sidney's very much a male name... Do you get female Sids in the States?

It's a proper Uncle's name too my mind!

I quite like Wilfred, as 40s comics and kids stories always had tearaway kids called Fred or Wilf!

:) rufus
 

Miss Neecerie

I'll Lock Up
Messages
6,616
Location
The land of Sinatra, Hoboken
The boy's and girl's name Sydney \s(y)-dney, syd-ney\ is pronounced SIHD-nee. It is of Old English origin, and its meaning is "wide meadow". Also possibly place name: Saint Denis. Sidney is favored as a name for boys, and Sydney is almost entirely used for girls, probably due to influence in the 1980s from madam/celebrity Sydney Biddle Barrows.



So like the city= girl.....


In 2007, the name Sydney was ranked #37
 

Warbaby

One Too Many
Messages
1,549
Location
The Wilds of Vancouver Island
My ancestors on the maternal side of the family tree tended to pick interesting names for their offspring. My grandfather's name was Ira and his brothers were Ord and Jay, his sisters were Blanche and Viva. His father, Harrison, had brothers named Wesley and Kingsley. My grandmother was Bess and her sister was Minnie - not Elizabeth and Minerva, but Bess and Minnie were their given names. Going back two or three more generations, there was Zadok (pronounced 'Zeddick', according to my grandmother), and my two favorites, Sabry and Sychie. Both names were the result of mispronouncing (and misspelling) 'Sabre' and 'Psyche'.
 

Rufus

Practically Family
Messages
518
Location
London
Ira's a fantastic name, Warbaby!

Of course I'm going to start sobbing and singing Johnny Cash ballads now, but in my house, that's a good thing!

:) R
 

Classydame

One of the Regulars
Messages
265
Location
Bellflower, CA
In my family tree I have a James Armenus-b1834, a Lura-b1867, a Mary Etta (Mamie)-b1873, Gladys Ariel-b1897, an Anna-b1870's, a Frank Willie-b1870's,
a female family friend who was very pretty named Persis-b1890's, another female friend named Iva, Julius Gilbert-b1892, my grandma Gloria Maxine b1926, the family thought Gloria was to scandalous so they called her Maxine, great cousins Nadine and Max, my other grandma was Philomena-b1921.

I thought if I had a girl I would name her Cara Philomena but alas I had a son and named him Bret Alexander. No family name but I figured if he didn't like Bret he could go with all the forms of Alexander, ie. Andy, Drew, Al, Alex, Drew. He still hates his name though. [huh] I have always loved Samantha also. My name is Shellie, plain but spelled differently so have to spell all the time.:rolleyes:
 

SGT Rocket

Practically Family
Messages
600
Location
Twin Cities, Minn
Names

Hmmmm,

My name is Brian and my wife is Nancy. Not too vintage. Our kids are Silas and Chloe. We named Chloe after my great-aunt Cleo. My wife thought Cleo was too old school, so we settled on Chloe.

I had (she died) an aunt Eleanor, an uncle Less, and an uncle Riley. My Mamaw name was Jewel, my grandfather Herbert, my dad was Donald. My mom's name was Evea, that's kind of vintage~she was born in 1932.

I also have multiple relatives named Evelyn and Loren and one Lucile. I had an aunt June and Charlotte. I also had an uncle Willie. Man, he was a great person, I really miss him. I have a cousin Ronnie who recently died.

Oh, my mom's middle name is Romilda. You don't see that on many birth certificates these days!!! lol

Edit: My great-grandmother's name was Jewel, my grandmother's name on my dad's side was Vivian.
 

JupitersDarling

One of the Regulars
Messages
221
Location
South Carolina
I was named Esther after my maternal great grandma (a Minnesota Swede!), but I was the only Esther I knew of growing up, besides the swimmer Esther Williams, and the Old Testament queen. Then Madonna changed her name, and I went to a college where there were at least 7-8 other Esthers. lol
(Curiously, all but one of them were East-Asian internationals or Asian-American girls... I also noticed students of east Asian extraction were more likely to sport "old fashioned" names like Agnes, Grace, Anita, and I think I even recall one Gladys!)

My paternal great aunts had some unusual older names you don't see often today. Juanita, Lora, and Serena. They were from an old Southern family of British colonial descent, and their older brother had a more conventionally southern name (Clayton), so who knows where my great great grandma (named Hettie Lou, BTW!) got the names. I guess she got tired of romantic Spanish names for her girls though, since their baby sister (my grandma) was named plain ol' Betty!
 

Minerva

Familiar Face
Messages
74
Location
Downers Grove, IL USA
The custom for my father's family is generally to name children for their grandparents, and go further up the tree if you have more than four children. They run to French and German names, despite not really being French or German -- Otto, Hilda, Josephine, Eulalie, Octave, Anatole. My personal favourite 'weird' family name here is Bazeleid. I'm guessing that to be the female version of Basil. The poor girl had a different spelling on every document I've seen so far!

My father's father was Otto Joseph Sr, named for his grandfather Othello Joseph as it turns out; we spent years trying to figure out how a group of allegedly French people were ending up with German names. It makes the families easy to spot when doing genealogy research. :D

Our daughter is Abigail Rose, which turned out to be a family name as well. We've got several Abigails up the tree, one of my great great-grandmothers was Rose Victoria, and one of my great-great aunts was Rosa, named for her aunt Rosa. If we are ever so fortunate as to have another daughter, she'll be Alyce Eveline. My MIL's middle name is Alyce, as was my FIL's grandmother. One of my great-aunts was Eveline, named for her grandmother Marie-Eveline. Fortunately my family runs to girls because I have no idea what we'd do for a boy's name. Maybe we're due for another round of Othello Joseph ....
 

lizylou

Familiar Face
Messages
92
Location
Texas
JupitersDarling said:
I was named Esther after my maternal great grandma (a Minnesota Swede!), but I was the only Esther I knew of growing up, besides the swimmer Esther Williams, and the Old Testament queen. Then Madonna changed her name, and I went to a college where there were at least 7-8 other Esthers. lol

I too had a grandmother named Esther. I have two boys, Andre' Christopher, My husband loves hip-hop so the name comes from Outcast rapper
Andre 3000, Im not too keen on it, but I got to choose Christopher as his middle name. Our Second child is named Elijha Nathaniel, I had the chance to choose the first name this time. I just changed the spelling. My husband gave him Nathaniel. I was so thrilled Mike(my husband) didn't chose
Big Boi lol he kept Elijha's name biblical.

If ever we had a daughter, we would love to name her Esther Jane, or Esther Jeane, We got it from the movie ' A Christmas Story '. When we both heard it, we said thats a great name! So I think we will keep it just incase!

I was named Elizabeth Victoria, I used to hate to tell people my first and middle name together because I felt so vain! I used to rather be called Lisa . A few months after moving to England from Delaware, I loved hearing the English say Elizabeth, it sounds so beautiful compared to when Americans say it (no offence to us Americans), so now when I meet someone I tell them Im Elizabeth.
 

Miss Sis

One Too Many
Messages
1,888
Location
Hampshire, England Via the Antipodes.
Rufus said:
Sidney's very much a male name... Do you get female Sids in the States?

I find the American habit of using what I think of as boys names for girls quite strange.

Names like Cameron, Hayden, Sidney/Sydney, Ashley, Sean/Shaun etc. They are boys names!

Are there not enough girls names to go round these days???? :p

Speaking of old fashioned names, my Grandfather's three sisters were called, in order, Doris, Myrtle and Iza. I think they are some of the worst names ever!
 

Naama

Practically Family
Messages
667
Location
Vienna
I always hated my name since it's unusal, people often can't say it or they can't spell it or, what happens quite often, I get mistaken for a man (the name). It's pretty odd when the doctor calls you in by "Mr...." and you have to stand up and walk in, you'll get pretty funny looks... I wonder if people might think I'm a TV or somethin.

I don't like modern english names, what a lot of people over here used to name theire kids (I think that must had had the hights in the early 90's) like Jennifer, Kevin, Mandy, Justin, or especially, Jessica, nothing wrong with the name, but think about german people giving theire kids names which they can't pronounce properly! lol




Naama
 

fishmeok

Vendor
Messages
759
Location
minneapolis
Miss Neecerie said:
The boy's and girl's name Sydney \s(y)-dney, syd-ney\ is pronounced SIHD-nee. It is of Old English origin, and its meaning is "wide meadow". Also possibly place name: Saint Denis. Sidney is favored as a name for boys, and Sydney is almost entirely used for girls, probably due to influence in the 1980s from madam/celebrity Sydney Biddle Barrows.



So like the city= girl.....


In 2007, the name Sydney was ranked #37

I'm still putting Sidney high on the list, Sid, Siddy, good traditional punk name. We also found out this weekend that one of my wife's distant relatives was named Axel, which puts that in play as well. We also like good old time country names, Hank being my favorite. But we have a cousin with a Henry already which is where Henrick comes in as an option. May just have to see what he looks like before we decide...
Cheers
Mark
 

Rufus

Practically Family
Messages
518
Location
London
SM- bear in mid Sid was a nickname for Sid V.(His name was John..), nicknamed after Lydon's hamster which bit him... Explaining that to your lad might be slightly anticlimatic..

Son... I named you after a Punk rock hamster bite! ;-)

Traditional punk... words I thought I'd never see side by side..

Rufus..'the day the world turned ' Dayglo
 
Girls - Molly, Polly, Martha. Though Martha is a bit of a granny name, it was my grannys name. I'd hate for my child to be picked on for something I'd done to them :( I also love love love my Dads mums name - Dorothea Ingaborg. We all called her Inga.

Boys - Edward, Oscar, Joshua, though I don't like 'Josh'.

I don't intend to have all of those children btw.
 

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