1900s Baby Names

5,549 names were given to children in the United States between 1900 and 1909, 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.

All Girls Boys Unisex

Rankings for

#385
Jose Jose is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "he will add," the Spanish and Portuguese form of Joseph.
1,642 in the 1900s
#386
Johnie
1,639 in the 1900s
#387
Isaac Isaac is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "he laughs," from Yitzhak.
1,638 in the 1900s
#388
Gracie Gracie is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "grace."
1,637 in the 1900s
#389
Lora Lora means from Laurentum, and the laurel is one step removed — the Roman town was named for its bay trees, and the personal name says which town you came from rather than which plant crowned you.
1,636 in the 1900s
#390
Cornelia
1,630 in the 1900s
#391
Delia Delia means of Delos, and it is a title for Artemis rather than a name in itself — she was born on that island, so calling her Delia is like calling someone the Nazarene.
1,629 in the 1900s
#392
Maudie
1,626 in the 1900s
#393
Nathan Nathan is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "he gave," from Natan.
1,616 in the 1900s
#394
Angeline Angeline means messenger, and the Greek word behind it was an ordinary job title — angelos named someone carrying news, and every wing and choir attached to it since came later.
1,609 in the 1900s
#395
Lorraine Lorraine is a girl's name from the French region, whose own name means the kingdom of Lothair — a Frankish king's realm that was carved out of Charlemagne's empire and slowly disappeared.
1,605 in the 1900s
#396
Birdie
1,605 in the 1900s
#397
Mayme
1,589 in the 1900s
#398
Olivia Olivia is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "olive tree," used as the feminine form of Oliver.
1,575 in the 1900s
#399
Rosalie Rosalie is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "rose."
1,571 in the 1900s
#400
Max Max is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "greatest."
1,567 in the 1900s
#401
Mack Mack means son of, and on its own it is only half a name — the Gaelic mac is a prefix, so using it alone is like naming a child Junior with nothing in front of it.
1,562 in the 1900s
#402
Rufus Rufus means red-haired, and it named a king by his complexion — William II of England was called Rufus for his ruddy face, and he died with an arrow in him in the New Forest.
1,552 in the 1900s
#403
Adelaide Adelaide means noble in kind, and it is one of only three names in this group our data marks as rising — 230th in Canada, 289th in the United States, 344th in England and Wales, 416th in France and 618th in Scotland, and setting its English peak in the most recent year we hold.
1,547 in the 1900s
#404
Arnold Arnold means eagle power, and England and Wales ranks it 631st on 59 births — well above the United States at 1478th, which is not what the name's twentieth-century American associations would predict.
1,546 in the 1900s
#405
Lenora
1,541 in the 1900s
#406
Janet Janet is a girl's name, a Scottish diminutive of Jane meaning God is gracious.
1,541 in the 1900s
#407
Eloise Eloise is a girl's name of French origin, from the medieval Héloïse.
1,540 in the 1900s
#408
Percy
1,539 in the 1900s
#409
Constance Constance is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "steadfastness," one of the abstract virtue names the early Church favored.
1,538 in the 1900s
#410
Leila Leila means night, from Arabic, and it is one of the most evenly spread names on this site — France 211th, the United States 259th, England and Wales 269th, Scotland 282nd and Ireland 339th, a spread of just 128 places.
1,529 in the 1900s
#411
Wanda Wanda is a girl's name from Polish, borne by a legendary queen who drowned herself in the Vistula rather than marry a German prince.
1,527 in the 1900s
#412
Irving Irving names a Scottish river valley, and it reached American use largely through one writer — Washington Irving, who gave English both Rip Van Winkle and the nickname Gotham for New York.
1,524 in the 1900s
#413
Bill Bill comes from William, and the B is the point — medieval English made pet names by rhyming, which is why Will became Bill, Rob became Bob and Rick became Dick.
1,523 in the 1900s
#414
Lorena Lorena is a place before it is a person — Lorraine is the land of Lothar, a Frankish king whose kingdom was carved out of Charlemagne's empire and named after him directly.
1,522 in the 1900s
#415
Dan Dan means he judged, and it is a full Hebrew name in its own right before it is short for Daniel — one of Jacob's twelve sons, and the tribe that gave its name to the northern border of Israel.
1,504 in the 1900s
#416
Hallie Hallie is a girl's name with more than one line.
1,496 in the 1900s
#417
Willis Willis means son of Will, and the Will behind it is William — a name so common in medieval England that its diminutives generated a whole family of surnames, of which this is one.
1,495 in the 1900s
#418
Reba
1,493 in the 1900s
#419
Lelia
1,476 in the 1900s
#420
Dolores Dolores is a girl's name meaning sorrows — taken from a title of the Virgin Mary, Our Lady of Sorrows, which counts seven specific griefs.
1,468 in the 1900s
#421
Neva
1,432 in the 1900s
#422
Sylvester Sylvester means of the woods, and a pope carried it into the calendar — Sylvester I died on 31 December, which is why New Year's Eve is still called Silvester across much of Europe.
1,411 in the 1900s
#423
Maxine Maxine is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "greatest," a feminine form of Maximus.
1,409 in the 1900s
#424
Angela Angela is a girl's name from the Greek for messenger, the word that also gives us angel.
1,400 in the 1900s
#425
Tommie Tommie means twin, and it is one of the most evenly split names on this site — 33 percent of the births in our records are female, because it serves as a short form of both Thomas and Thomasina.
1,397 in the 1900s
#426
Elvira
1,393 in the 1900s
#427
Glen Glen means a narrow valley, and it is one of very few Gaelic words that English borrowed wholesale rather than adapting to its own sounds.
1,392 in the 1900s
#428
Lulu
1,376 in the 1900s
#429
Orville
1,365 in the 1900s
#430
Bettie
1,363 in the 1900s
#431
Bert
1,363 in the 1900s
#432
Myra Myra was invented by a poet — Fulke Greville coined it around 1580, probably by rearranging Mary, and every later meaning attached to it was supplied after the fact.
1,361 in the 1900s

What made a 1900s name

Nothing about the sound of it. A name is on this page because children in the United States were registered with it between 1900 and 1909, and its position is simply how many. Every list of "1900s 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.