1950s Baby Names

15,671 names were given to children in the United States between 1950 and 1959, 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

#337
Gilbert Gilbert is a boy's name from Germanic elements meaning bright pledge, and it founded the only medieval religious order native to England.
18,931 in the 1950s
#338
Garry Garry means spear, and it reached English through a steel town — Gary, Indiana was named for a US Steel chairman, and the place name did more for the given name than any of its Germanic ancestors.
18,868 in the 1950s
#339
Holly Holly is a girl's name of Old English origin taken from the tree, from holegn.
18,811 in the 1950s
#340
Karl Karl means free man, and it is the original German spelling behind Charles — the word named a free peasant, so it began at the bottom of the free classes and rose to name emperors.
18,798 in the 1950s
#341
Monica Monica is a girl's name whose meaning is 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.
18,736 in the 1950s
#342
Kent Kent is the oldest recorded place name in England — Cantium appears in Greek writing before the Roman invasion, and its meaning was already uncertain to the Romans who wrote it down.
18,730 in the 1950s
#343
Janis Janis fell further than any name in this sweep — 3,217 American births in 1947 down to 10 in the most recent year on record, which is a fall of more than 99 percent.
18,720 in the 1950s
#344
Kurt Kurt means bold counsel, shortened from Konrad — and the courteous reading commonly given is a false friend, coming from an unrelated French word that only sounds similar.
18,656 in the 1950s
#345
Todd Todd is a boy's name from a northern English dialect word for a fox, given as a nickname to someone crafty or red-haired.
18,618 in the 1950s
#346
Shelley Shelley means a clearing on a ledge, and it has nothing to do with shells — the poet's surname records a patch of high ground in Suffolk or Sussex, not anything from a beach.
18,534 in the 1950s
#347
Marianne Marianne is the personification of the French Republic, and her bust stands in every town hall in France — so the name carries a civic weight in one market that it has nowhere else.
18,498 in the 1950s
#348
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.
18,431 in the 1950s
#349
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.
18,245 in the 1950s
#350
Lewis Lewis is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "famous warrior," the English form of Louis.
18,214 in the 1950s
#351
Wesley Wesley is a boy's name of English origin meaning "western meadow," from the Old English west and leah.
18,207 in the 1950s
#352
Tracy Tracy is a Norman place name that became a surname, then a boys' name, then overwhelmingly a girls' name — about 81 percent of recorded births are female.
18,137 in the 1950s
#353
Donnie Donnie ranks 563rd in Ireland and 1,804th in the United States, so the country with a fraction of the births ranks it three times higher — a pattern we see when a name goes home.
18,131 in the 1950s
#354
Clyde Clyde took nothing from Bonnie and Clyde.
18,045 in the 1950s
#355
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.
17,975 in the 1950s
#356
Jessie Jessie is a name that arrives from two unrelated directions — the Scottish pet form of Janet, and a feminine of the Hebrew Jesse.
17,818 in the 1950s
#357
Neil Neil means champion or cloud, from Irish, and it traveled to Iceland with the Vikings and back to England with the Normans — so the English Neil arrived by way of Scandinavia and France.
17,773 in the 1950s
#358
Allan Allan has no settled meaning at all — handsome, little rock and a deer are all proposed for the Breton original, and the name reached England through Brittany rather than through Ireland or Scotland at all.
17,734 in the 1950s
#359
Veronica Veronica is a girl's name from a Latin phrase meaning true image, and the saint behind it was invented to explain a relic — the cloth came first, and the woman was named after it.
17,649 in the 1950s
#360
Jimmie Jimmie means supplanter, shortened from James, and about 17 percent of recorded births are female — a much higher share than most nickname-names of this shape, which usually resolve firmly to one side or the other.
17,629 in the 1950s
#361
Mildred Mildred is a girl's name from Old English elements meaning gentle strength, and it is among the least fashionable names of the twentieth century — yet it is reviving, ninety years after its 1920 peak.
17,623 in the 1950s
#362
Perry Perry means at the pear tree, from an English place name — and it is reviving, at 1,373rd in the United States and 1,681st in England and Wales.
17,364 in the 1950s
#363
Eva Eva is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "life" or "living."
17,166 in the 1950s
#364
Franklin Franklin means a freeholder — a man who owned his land but held no noble rank, a specific medieval class.
17,091 in the 1950s
#365
Rachel Rachel is a girl's name from Hebrew meaning ewe, borne by Jacob's wife in Genesis.
16,849 in the 1950s
#366
Shelia Shelia is Cecilia with two letters swapped and four languages in between — Cecilia became the Irish Síle, Síle was written Sheila in English, and Sheila was misspelled into Shelia often enough to become its own name.
16,791 in the 1950s
#367
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 been saying to each other all along.
16,715 in the 1950s
#368
Jody Jody serves Judith, Joseph and Jude at once, which is why it is 64 percent female rather than resolving to one side — three unrelated parents pulling in different directions.
16,680 in the 1950s
#369
Roxanne Roxanne means dawn or bright, and it is Persian rather than Greek — Alexander married Roxana in Bactria, and she and their son were murdered after his death.
16,618 in the 1950s
#370
Lillian Lillian is a girl's name usually explained as an elaboration of Lily, from the Latin lilium, and sometimes as a variant of Elizabeth by way of the medieval pet form Lilian.
16,560 in the 1950s
#371
Carole Carole is a girl's name meaning free man, the French spelling of Carol.
16,535 in the 1950s
#372
Manuel Manuel is a boy's name meaning God is with us, the Spanish short form of Emmanuel.
16,474 in the 1950s
#373
Brad Brad means broad clearing, shortened from Bradley — and the broad element is the same word as the modern English broad, one of the few Old English place-name terms still transparent.
16,466 in the 1950s
#374
Josephine Josephine is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "he will add," the French feminine form of Joseph.
16,462 in the 1950s
#375
Carrie Carrie is a girl's name, a pet form of Caroline meaning free man through Charles.
16,254 in the 1950s
#376
Kirk Kirk means church, and it is Norse rather than English — the Vikings brought the word to northern England and Scotland, which is why Scots say kirk where English says church.
16,252 in the 1950s
#377
Patty Patty belonged to Martha before it belonged to Patricia — the pet form was reassigned in the twentieth century, one of several nicknames in English that quietly changed parents.
16,133 in the 1950s
#378
Doreen Doreen has two possible parents and neither is settled — an Irish Doireann whose own meaning is disputed, or Dora with an Irish diminutive attached, which would make it a nineteenth-century construction.
16,105 in the 1950s
#379
Sherri Sherri looks French and is not — it respells Cherie, meaning darling, but Cherie is not a traditional French given name at all, so the name is an English invention wearing French clothes.
16,104 in the 1950s
#380
Charlie Charlie is a name of Germanic origin meaning "free man."
16,055 in the 1950s
#381
Carlos Carlos is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "free man."
15,996 in the 1950s
#382
Grace Grace is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "favor" or "blessing," from gratia.
15,982 in the 1950s
#383
Daryl Daryl completes a set of three — Darrell, Darryl and Daryl are one Norman place name split across three spellings, and all three appear in this group, carrying about 328,000 births between them.
15,823 in the 1950s
#384
Freddie Freddie is a name of Germanic origin meaning "peaceful ruler."
15,812 in the 1950s

What Made a 1950s Name

Children in the United States were registered with it between 1950 and 1959. A name's position here is how many of them were.

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.