1940s Baby Names

13,557 names were given to children in the United States between 1940 and 1949, 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

#577
Amy Amy is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "beloved," and unusually the name is a past participle — someone who has been loved rather than someone lovable.
5,333 in the 1940s
#578
Nadine Nadine looks entirely French and is Russian underneath — it is Nadezhda, the ordinary Russian word for hope, borrowed into French and given a French ending.
5,323 in the 1940s
#579
Susanne
5,322 in the 1940s
#580
Rodger
5,292 in the 1940s
#581
Darrel
5,291 in the 1940s
#582
Vicky Vicky means victory, and it is one of the clearest cases on this site of a monarch making a name — Victoria was rare in English before the queen and ordinary for a century afterward.
5,264 in the 1940s
#583
Jeannie
5,255 in the 1940s
#584
Julian Julian is a boy's name of Latin origin, derived from the Roman family name Julius.
5,254 in the 1940s
#585
Gretchen Gretchen means little pearl, and German uses her name for a kind of question — a Gretchenfrage is the awkward essential one you cannot dodge, after the question she puts to Faust about religion.
5,192 in the 1940s
#586
Glenna
5,182 in the 1940s
#587
Lou Lou is a girl's name in France, a short form of Louise and Louis meaning "famous warrior."
5,149 in the 1940s
#588
Laurel Laurel names the plant directly, which sets it apart from Lora and Loren on this site — those reach the laurel through a Roman town, while this one is simply the tree.
5,145 in the 1940s
#589
Genevieve Genevieve is a girl's name of Gaulish origin whose meaning is not settled.
5,136 in the 1940s
#590
Sallie Sallie means princess, and it reached English through a sound swap — Sarah became Sally the way Mary became Molly, with the r softening to an l in ordinary speech.
5,128 in the 1940s
#591
Nick Nick means victory of the people, and the compound is political rather than personal — the Greek joins victory to the citizen body, so it describes a public triumph and not an individual one.
5,120 in the 1940s
#592
Greg Greg means watchful, and the Greek is a command rather than a description — gregorein means stay awake, which early Christians took as an instruction about the second coming.
5,101 in the 1940s
#593
Isaac Isaac is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "he laughs," from Yitzhak.
5,089 in the 1940s
#594
Sonja Sonja means wisdom, and the great church of Constantinople carries the same word — Hagia Sophia was dedicated to Holy Wisdom as an aspect of God, not to any saint of that name.
5,086 in the 1940s
#595
Clark Clark means a clergyman, and the job drifted — a clericus was in holy orders, but since the clergy were the ones who could write, the word slid across to mean anyone who kept records, which is what a clerk still is.
5,066 in the 1940s
#596
Claudette Claudette means little lame one, and it is an uncomplimentary name that a Roman dynasty made prestigious — the Claudii held the emperorship, and the byname's original sense stopped mattering.
5,047 in the 1940s
#597
Gerry
5,037 in the 1940s
#598
Alicia Alicia is a girl's name of Germanic origin meaning "noble," a Latinate form of Alice.
5,032 in the 1940s
#599
Maggie Maggie is a girl's name of Greek origin meaning "pearl."
5,030 in the 1940s
#600
Melanie Melanie is a girl's name of Greek origin meaning "black" or "dark."
5,029 in the 1940s
#601
Kenny Kenny sits on top of two different Gaelic names that English collapsed into one — Cináed, born of fire, and Coinneach, handsome.
5,009 in the 1940s
#602
Mable Mable means lovable, and the name lost its front end — it began as Amabel, and English wore the initial A away entirely, which is the same process that turned an ewt into a newt.
4,927 in the 1940s
#603
Ivan Ivan is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is gracious."
4,890 in the 1940s
#604
Ken
4,874 in the 1940s
#605
Nelda
4,870 in the 1940s
#606
Lupe
4,864 in the 1940s
#607
Jacob Jacob is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "supplanter" or "holder of the heel," from Ya'aqov.
4,853 in the 1940s
#608
Reba
4,847 in the 1940s
#609
Inez Inez means chaste, and the Spanish spelling hides a Greek original — Agnes became Inés because Spanish dropped the initial vowel sound, so the two look unrelated and are the same name.
4,841 in the 1940s
#610
Rhonda Rhonda is a girl's name from a Welsh river valley, and the great spear reading usually given for it is wrong — the Rhondda is named for its own noisiness, not for a weapon.
4,835 in the 1940s
#611
Jeffery Jeffery is a boy's name whose first element is genuinely disputed, though the second means peace.
4,820 in the 1940s
#612
Margo
4,803 in the 1940s
#613
Freda Freda means peace, and it is a fragment of several longer names — Winifred, Frederica and Alfreda all shorten to it, so which one a Freda descends from usually cannot be recovered.
4,803 in the 1940s
#614
Rosetta
4,800 in the 1940s
#615
Muriel Muriel means bright sea, from Gaelic, and it reached English twice — once through Irish and Scottish settlement and once through Breton, carried back across the Channel by the Normans.
4,789 in the 1940s
#616
Woodrow
4,766 in the 1940s
#617
Ellis Ellis is a name of Hebrew origin meaning "the Lord is my God."
4,741 in the 1940s
#618
Joanna Joanna means God is gracious, and it charts in all seven markets we track — the United States 306th, Ireland 367th, Scotland 395th, Northern Ireland 432nd, England and Wales 514th and France 721st.
4,709 in the 1940s
#619
Camille Camille is a unisex name of Latin origin, from a Roman word for a young attendant at religious ceremonies.
4,704 in the 1940s
#620
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.
4,691 in the 1940s
#621
Ramon Ramon means protecting counsel, and both halves are Germanic — the Visigoths brought it to Iberia, so a name that reads as thoroughly Spanish is Gothic underneath, like Fernando and Alonzo.
4,683 in the 1940s
#622
Tyrone Tyrone means Eoghan's land, an Irish county, and it reached American use almost entirely through one actor — Tyrone Power, whose grandfather took the name from the county his family came from.
4,669 in the 1940s
#623
Dallas Dallas is the only rising name in this group — it peaked in 2015 and is still climbing, at 238th in the United States.
4,669 in the 1940s
#624
Monica Monica is a girl's name whose meaning is genuinely unknown, and whose saint — the mother of Augustine — came from Roman North Africa, so the name may be Berber rather than Latin or Greek at all.
4,662 in the 1940s

What made a 1940s name

Nothing about the sound of it. A name is on this page because children in the United States were registered with it between 1940 and 1949, and its position is simply how many. Every list of "1940s 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.