1880s Baby Names
1,426 names were given to children in the United States between 1880 and 1889, ranked below by how many.
A name's place is its total across those ten years. Names that appear in only some of the decade say so, because a name recorded once is a different fact from one recorded every year.
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#2,413Wells Wells is a boy's name of English origin meaning someone who lived by a spring.16 in the 1880s 3 of 10 years
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#2,418Dominic Dominic is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "of the Lord," from dominus.16 in the 1880s 3 of 10 years
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#2,429Shepherd Shepherd is a boy's name of English origin, the occupational surname for someone who tended sheep.16 in the 1880s 3 of 10 years
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#2,439Knox Knox is a boy's name of Scottish origin meaning "round hill."15 in the 1880s 2 of 10 years
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#2,482Gerard Gerard is a boy's name from Germanic elements meaning brave with the spear.14 in the 1880s 2 of 10 years
What made a 1880s name
Nothing about the sound of it. A name is on this page because children in the United States were registered with it between 1880 and 1889, and its position is simply how many. Every list of "1880s names" you will find elsewhere is somebody's sense of the period; this one is the register.
Why Some Names Only Cover Part of the Decade
A name that appears in three of the ten years either arrived partway through or faded out — and either is more interesting than the total on its own. The statistics offices do not publish names given to very few children in a year, so a gap can also mean the count dropped below the threshold rather than to nothing.
Where to Go Next
Open any name to see its full curve — most of these have a hundred and forty years of it. Or compare the ends of the same measurement: the most popular names now and the rarest.