1920s Baby Names

13,525 names were given to children in the United States between 1920 and 1929, 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

#145
Pearl Pearl is a girl's name taken from the gem, and it charts in all seven markets we track.
33,570 in the 1920s
#146
Floyd Floyd is the same name as Lloyd, and the F is a mistake that stuck — English had no way to say the Welsh double L, so it substituted the closest sound it had, and the substitution became a separate name.
33,490 in the 1920s
#147
Viola Viola means violet, and it names the flower, the instrument and a Shakespeare heroine from the same Latin root.
33,396 in the 1920s
#148
Lloyd Lloyd is a boy's name from the Welsh word for gray, and the double L is a genuine Welsh consonant that English has no letter for.
33,380 in the 1920s
#149
Ray Ray is a boy's name that serves as a short form of Raymond and as the English word for a beam of light.
33,190 in the 1920s
#150
Vera Vera is a girl's name with two origins that both work. In Russian it means "faith"; in Latin vera means "true" — and unusually for such a pair, the two senses reinforce rather than contradict each other.
32,662 in the 1920s
#151
Bessie Bessie is a girl's name meaning God is my oath, a pet form of Elizabeth.
32,347 in the 1920s
#152
Clifford Clifford is a boy's name from an English place name meaning a ford by a cliff — a river crossing below a steep bank.
31,688 in the 1920s
#153
Frederick Frederick is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "peaceful ruler."
31,679 in the 1920s
#154
Theodore Theodore is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "gift of God," formed from theos, meaning god, and doron, meaning gift.
31,469 in the 1920s
#155
Beverly Beverly is a name from an English town meaning beaver stream, and it began as a boys' name before crossing decisively to girls.
31,265 in the 1920s
#156
Alma Alma is a girl's name with several competing origins: "nourishing" in Latin, "soul" in Spanish, and "young woman" in Hebrew.
30,759 in the 1920s
#157
Myrtle Myrtle means the evergreen shrub, and it was the plant of Aphrodite — carried by Greek and Roman brides long before the Victorians made it a name.
30,671 in the 1920s
#158
Violet Violet is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "purple," taken from viola, the Latin word for the purple flower.
30,121 in the 1920s
#159
Vernon Vernon is a Norman place name meaning a place of alders, from a Gaulish word — so a French town gave England a surname that America turned into a first name, three languages deep.
29,944 in the 1920s
#160
Nellie Nellie is a girl's name of Greek origin meaning "shining light."
29,817 in the 1920s
#161
Clyde Clyde took nothing from Bonnie and Clyde.
29,791 in the 1920s
#162
Ella Ella is a girl's name with two distinct origins. The Norman French line derives from the Germanic element ali, meaning other or foreign, while a Hebrew line gives Ella as a word for a terebinth tree.
29,684 in the 1920s
#163
Lillie Lillie is a girl's name from the flower, which has stood for purity in Christian art for so long that the association predates the name.
29,587 in the 1920s
#164
Herman Herman means army man, and the German national hero Hermann is a Latin scribe's version of a Cheruscan name we cannot now recover — Arminius, the chief who destroyed three Roman legions in AD 9.
29,205 in the 1920s
#165
Jeanne Jeanne is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is gracious," the French feminine of Jean.
29,190 in the 1920s
#166
Chester Chester is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "fortress" or "walled camp."
28,675 in the 1920s
#167
Eileen Eileen is a girl's name anglicizing the Irish Eibhlín, and its meaning is genuinely unsettled — it may render Helen, or Evelyn, or a native Irish name.
28,623 in the 1920s
#168
Lee Lee is a name from the Old English word for a woodland clearing, and it is one of the most productive elements in English place names — the ending of Ashley, Bradley, Shirley and Beverly.
28,586 in the 1920s
#169
Ellen Ellen is a girl's name of Greek origin, a medieval English form of Helen whose meaning has never been settled.
28,491 in the 1920s
#170
Billie Billie is a name of Germanic origin meaning "resolute protector."
28,019 in the 1920s
#171
Lucy Lucy is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "light," from lux.
27,599 in the 1920s
#172
Philip Philip is a boy's name from Greek elements meaning lover of horses.
27,426 in the 1920s
#173
Johnnie Johnnie means God is gracious, a pet form of John.
27,361 in the 1920s
#174
Alvin Alvin means elf-friend, from an Old English name that treats elves as beings whose favor was worth having.
27,090 in the 1920s
#175
Minnie Minnie Mouse did not make Minnie popular.
27,050 in the 1920s
#176
Charlie Charlie is a name of Germanic origin meaning "free man."
27,007 in the 1920s
#177
Sylvia Sylvia is a girl's name from the Latin for a forest, and the mother of Rome's founders bore it — Rhea Silvia, who was made a Vestal Virgin so she could not produce heirs.
26,965 in the 1920s
#178
Lester Lester means from Leicester, and the spelling is the honest one — Leicester has been pronounced LES-ter for centuries, so the surname simply wrote down what people had actually been saying to each other all along.
26,842 in the 1920s
#179
Wayne Wayne is an occupational surname meaning a wagon maker, and its life as a given name follows one man — John Wayne, who was born Marion Robert Morrison and renamed by a studio.
26,634 in the 1920s
#180
Vincent Vincent is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "conquering," from vincere, to conquer.
26,373 in the 1920s
#181
Donna Donna is a girl's name from the Italian word for a lady, a title used as a name.
26,223 in the 1920s
#182
Leona Leona means lioness, and our data marks it reviving across six markets — the United States 429th, France 556th, Scotland 631st, Ireland 705th and England and Wales 716th, all within 290 places.
26,133 in the 1920s
#183
Rosemary Rosemary is not Rose and Mary joined together — it is the herb, from a Latin phrase meaning dew of the sea.
26,020 in the 1920s
#184
Stella Stella is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "star."
25,993 in the 1920s
#185
Leon Leon is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "lion."
25,891 in the 1920s
#186
Gordon Gordon is a Scottish surname turned given name, from a place in Berwickshire whose meaning is not settled — spacious fort is the usual gloss but it is a guess.
25,829 in the 1920s
#187
Mattie Mattie serves two entirely unrelated names — Martha, which is Aramaic for a lady, and Matilda, which is Germanic for might in battle.
25,708 in the 1920s
#188
Margie Margie means pearl, carried from Margaret — and the Greek behind it may be a loan from an Indo-Iranian source, so the word for the gem traveled a long way before it became a name.
25,606 in the 1920s
#189
Lewis Lewis is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "famous warrior," the English form of Louis.
25,491 in the 1920s
#190
Glenn Glenn is a boy's name from the Gaelic word for a narrow valley, and like Craig and Dale it is a plain landscape noun.
25,482 in the 1920s
#191
Calvin Calvin is a boy's name of French origin meaning "little bald one," from the Latin calvus, bald.
24,948 in the 1920s
#192
Genevieve Genevieve is a girl's name of Gaulish origin whose meaning is not settled.
24,849 in the 1920s

What made a 1920s name

Nothing about the sound of it. A name is on this page because children in the United States were registered with it between 1920 and 1929, and its position is simply how many. Every list of "1920s 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.