Hello Swistle!
I have a quandary I haven’t seen you address and I was hopeful you’d be able to help me.

We are pregnant with our second son, he’s due in May, and our preferred name with him is George. We like that George is a storied name with history and lots of people share the name, so it’s not tied to any one person or stereotype. We like his first and last name would make him google anonymous should he prefer. Our quandary is our last name is Burns, and frankly the name George Burns has “been done” before. So my question is “How bad is it if we name our son a name that has a somewhat famous former occupant?”

I’m cringing typing out the words, because my manta picking baby names is generally “first do no harm” and “if it starts out a joke, it doesn’t end up on the birth certificate”. I know all names have drawbacks, but it’s hard to pull the trigger on a name if you feel like your child may spend a lifetime fielding questions like “Where’s your Gracie Allen?”. I have told select acquaintances and friends about the name just to gauge reactions and the response seems varied by age. George Burns died 22 years ago, and I’m not sure how enduringly famous exactly he was, as people 40’s and younger seem to not know about him or mention him being a famous namesake, and a few people over 40 are appalled I would name a child a name that someone else has had.

I find the fact that George Burns was a pseudonym for the original George Burns (formerly Nathan Birnbaum) soothing. He didn’t actually own the name! He picked it because it sounds good together! I’ve facebooked searched the name and there’s a surprising amount of George Burns listed. Perhaps I should message them and ask them how big of a hassle their name is. Maybe I’m just overthinking this.

I would prefer not to go back to the drawing board if most people are going to be fine with the name George Burns on a child born in 2019, but it’s hard to gauge how big of an issue this is before naming him. I value your input, is this a deal breaker?

If you think this is a horrid idea, do you have any suggestions as for alternatives? Our first son has an honor name, and it’s an outlier for our style so I’m fine with the sibling names not matching. His name is Ezekiel Thomas and he goes exclusively by Zeke. Names I like include Peter, Ira, Felix, Linus, Benedict, (only as a middle). Names my husband likes are Bryon and Eugene. We both like Theodore…but we think it’s not this child’s name. If this baby was a girl we’d name her Jane Cordelia.

I love the name George. It does sound great with Burns. And I vote no to using it.

It fails my “Would I want this name?” test, even though I would like to be named either George or Georgia. I would wince every time I said my name and someone showed a reaction. “Name please?” “George Burns.” No, I don’t want to say that, either at my own appointment or at the baby’s.

I agree with you that an increasing percentage of people below a certain age will not have a strong association with the name—and the child’s peers are unlikely to have any association with the name at all. But I don’t think we’re yet at the point where I would want to have to cope (as the name-holder or as the parent) with the percentage of people who still DO have an association. It’s not about having a name that was once used by someone else; MOST names were once used by someone else. It’s about a name having an association with a particular famous person—and in this case, a person who was a bit of a caricature. I know he had a very long career and did many things; I’m not sure how the demographics would work out, but I was only familiar with his more recent work, where he was a very old man biting a cigar and waggling his eyebrows and making wisecracks, plus I was a little bit familiar with his wisecracking back-and-forth stuff with Gracie Allen. It’s not a negative association, but it’s still not one I’d want. Looking for the equivalent in a woman’s name (to make it easier to tell if it was a name I wanted for myself), I considered Joan Rivers and Lucille Ball. Very talented, long careers, and Joan and Lucy are great names—but I don’t want to be named (or have a daughter named) Joan Rivers, and I don’t want to be named (or have a daughter named) Lucille Ball. I don’t want to deal with the name recognition, even if not everyone recognizes it.

I didn’t know George Burns wasn’t his given name, but that only slightly affects things for me. “Name, please?” “George Burns.” “Oh! Like the…” “You know, it wasn’t his actual name.” No.

Let’s see, alternatives. Are you planning more children after this one? If so, I’d want to take the name Jane into account as a possible future sister name just in case.

I think of the name Ezekiel as both nicely ancient and currently hip; plus, it has a cool nickname. This makes it a hard act to follow. You’ve said it’s an honor name and a style outlier for you guys, so I won’t try too hard to coordinate, but on the other hand I don’t think I’d take an Ezekiel/Zeke and follow him with a Eugene; I’d be looking for something more along the lines of Felix. Peter works well, too, I think: less hip, but I think most people would be pleasantly surprised to encounter a young Pete. It’s a name so familiar the eye can accidentally skip past it in the baby name book, but in person it’s sounding fresh and unexpected again. Zeke and Pete is adorable, and both of them can go by their longer names if they don’t like it so much when they’re older.

Eugene and George make me wonder if you’d like the name Roger. I wasn’t even considering that name yet (I don’t expect it to cycle back around for another generation or so), until I saw somewhere that an old nickname for Roger was Hodge. Hodge! Ezekiel and Roger; Zeke and Hodge.

More to consider:

August Burns; Ezekiel and August; Zeke and Gus
Benjamin Burns; Ezekiel and Benjamin; Zeke and Ben
Calvin Burns; Ezekiel and Calvin; Zeke and Cal
Charles Burns; Ezekiel and Charles; Zeke and Charlie
Elliot Burns; Ezekiel and Elliot; Zeke and Elliot
Frederick Burns; Ezekiel and Frederick; Zeke and Fred
Henry Burns; Ezekiel and Henry; Zeke and Hank
Joel Burns; Ezekiel and Joel; Zeke and Joel
John Burns; Ezekiel and John; Zeke and Jack
Malachi Burns; Ezekiel and Malachi; Zeke and Mal or Zeke and Kai
Malcolm Burns; Ezekiel and Malcolm; Zeke and Mal
Simon Burns; Ezekiel and Simon; Zeke and Simon
Wesley Burns; Ezekiel and Wesley; Zeke and Wes
Wilson Burns; Ezekiel and Wilson; Zeke and Wil

Dear Swistle,

Our second baby boy, the fourth and last baby for our family, is due the first week of March. There really are no names we have fallen in love with that we would even settle on, at this point.

Here is our dilemma:

Our last name is “Herr” and rhymes with “fur”. Therefore, any name that ends with “-er” sounds like a stutter. Also, any name that is a verb, or COULD be a verb, is often laughable. For example, Colin, Paige, Mark, Philip, etc.

Our other kiddos are Reese Elizabeth, John Manning IV (n.n. Jack …yep …pretty bad connotation with our last name), and Henley Macon (girl). Given that our first two have single syllable names, and our third has two syllables …we are leaning towards two or more syllable names for our fourth. Also, we have honored all sides of the family with our older children, except my maternal side, so we are considering “King” as a middle name (other names from that side of the family we aren’t jumping to use are Bartow, Francis, Thomas, Whitley, Miller). Also, my husband’s family is rather large with numerous traditional names already claimed!

Independently, my husband likes Grayson. I feel that is too common. Other common contenders are Elijah, Weston and Bennett. However, Bennett can be shortened to Ben Herr (you see the comedy there, I am sure) I love the name Declan, but our dog is Dunkin.

We welcome any ideas! We love names with a biblical meaning or that relate to our ancestry (we are primarily Irish with lots of Western European).

Thank you for considering this conundrum! I love pouring over your blog for ideas!

Gratefully,
Ashley

This is an interesting puzzle. Normally, I like the sister names in a family to coordinate, and the brother names in a family to coordinate—even if the parents’ naming style is different for girls than for boys. So in a family with Reese and Henley for girls, and John/Jack for a boy, and another boy on the way, I’d be looking for something similar to John/Jack: Charles/Charlie, for example, or Andrew/Drew, or William/Liam. But in this case, you have two girls with coordinated names, and then you have a boy with an honor name that does not fall into what appears to be your usual style/popularity preferences.

And generally, when one child has an honor name, I feel that falls into the “easy to explain” category, giving parents more flexibility to NOT worry about coordinating with that name. On the other hand, I like to avoid setting up situations where a child’s name is repeatedly misunderstood because of sibling names; in this case, with two girls who have unisex/surname names and one boy with a traditional/classic name used almost exclusively for boys, adding a third unisex/surname name could cause the name to be mistaken for a girl’s name.

I’m mostly thinking aloud here, because most of the names you’re looking at are not unisex enough for me to suspect they’d cause any confusion; also, if you were writing to me saying you felt pressured to find a name to coordinate with John/Jack, I’d be assuring you that that was not necessary. I might, however, look for something more common and used almost exclusively for boys.

Weston seems to me like a good option. It’s not even in the Top 100 (for comparison, the Social Security Administration reports that in 2017, John was #27, Jack was #35, Grayson was #34, and Elijah was #8), and in the U.S. it’s used almost exclusively for boys. Weston Herr; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Weston. I like that.

Skimming the Celtic section of The Baby Name Wizard, I noticed Broderick. Quite uncommon, not currently even in the Top 1000, but familiar because of the surname. Snappy sound like Jack. Currently used in the U.S. exclusively for boys. Broderick Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Broderick. You could perhaps use Brody as a nickname. Reese, Jack, Henley, Brody.

Or Camden. Camden Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Camden; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Cam.

Cormac is similar to Declan but probably too close to Jack? But maybe not? And I can be unpicky about similarity between one sibling’s given name and another sibling’s nickname. I am not even opposed to rhyming nicknames, so that’s where I am on the spectrum of minding about this. Cormac Herr; Reese, John, Henley, Cormac; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Mac.

If I may delicately ask: how old is the dog? Because Declan just seems great to me, but I wouldn’t want the tongue-tangle of it, either. But if it wouldn’t be for very long… But maybe Dec Herr is something we want to avoid anyway.

Ooo, maybe Finian? Finian Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Finian; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Finn.

Or Griffin, same Finn nickname.

Keegan is cute, and similar to Declan. Keegan Herr; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Keegan.

Moving out of the Celtic section now:

Nolan Herr; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Nolan.

Calvin Herr: Reese, John, Henley, and Calvin; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Cal.

Wilson Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Wilson; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Wil/Will/Wils.

Milo Herr; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Milo.

Thompson Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Thompson; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Tom.

Lincoln, similar to Declan. Lincoln Herr; Reese, John, Henley, and Lincoln; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Linc/Link.

I love the name Paul and it’s a good biblical name and I love it with John, and it’s currently fairly uncommon, but it feels like there aren’t enough consonants in Paul Herr.

Maybe Simon. Simon Herr; Reese, Jack, Henley, and Simon.

We are expecting our third and last child and just found out we are having yet another boy. His older brothers are called Michael Oliver and Adrian Thomas, last name Building with a G. My husband and I have had trouble agreeing on names before, but this time we both thought Benjamin would make a perfect name for our last baby, as it is traditionally given to the youngest of a family. We can’t think of a middle name though, and although middle names are not particularly used in the US, maybe just an initial, we have a lot of family from south america and they usually refer to children by both first and middle names. So we want something that goes well (does not have to be latino). Please help us!

I am wondering if we should take into account the nickname Ben as we search. For example, I thought Benjamin John would be a nice combination, and nice with the brother names—but would he ever be called Ben John? Or would it always be the full first name plus middle?

I notice both brother names are five syllables for the first + middle. I don’t see any need to do the same for the third brother, but games like that can help start a list.

Benjamin Charles
Benjamin Daniel
Benjamin David
Benjamin Davis
Benjamin Jacob
Benjamin Joseph
Benjamin Leo
Benjamin Louis
Benjamin Matthew
Benjamin Maxwell
Benjamin Milo
Benjamin Patrick
Benjamin Robert

But I also like the sound/rhythm of a one-syllable middle:

Benjamin George
Benjamin James (uncertain about the repeating -jam-/Jam-)
Benjamin Luke
Benjamin Paul

Update on Baby Boy Whit-with-an-E

Update (and photo) on Baby Twins M@njg@fic, Siblings to Cecilia

We are in the middle of moving house, and it is overwhelming and stressful and sad and happy and THERE IS SO MUCH WORK AND IT WILL NEVER END, so I am hoping we can find some temporary ways to keep this blog up and running even while I am cleaning out from under the refrigerator (“Hey, there’s that dinosaur magnet we lost ten years ago!”) and trying to find which box I packed the postage stamps in (shouldn’t they be with the bills and address labels? why AREN’T they?).

For today, what if we talk about any name or names we’ve been noticing recently, for whatever reason. Is there a name you feel like you’re recently hearing a lot more of, or a name you think is due for a comeback, or a name you recently added to your Sad I Can’t Use It list, or a name you heard in real life for the first time, or a name you noticed in a book you were reading and have some thoughts about, or a name that is growing on you from hearing it in use?

We will try to keep things relatively positive overall, but I think it would be fine to tactfully/gently make less-positive remarks, as long as we are keeping in mind that there could be some dearly loved ones in our midst who have used the very names we have recently been wondering if they will EVER drop gracefully back out of fashion.

Dear Swistle,

We are having a second boy, due in February, and having a very hard time deciding on a name. My husband is Indian and most of his family is still located there. I am American and we live here in the US. Our last name Gupt@ is a very common Indian last name.

When naming our first son, we chose the name Rowan because we liked how similar it sounded to the Indian name Rohan, which we both loved. However, we felt Rohan would be frequently mispronounced in the US and Rowan was a good compromise because it would be pronounced the same in both cultures. (I have a name that is frequently mispronounced, so this is something that is always on the top of my mind when choosing a name.) We ended up giving him an Indian middle name, Aayan, so that he could always have the option to go by an Indian name if he wanted in the future.

When we got pregnant again, we said we would name the baby Aria if it was a girl (Arya is also an Indian name), but it turns out the baby is a boy and we are totally stuck. We want a name that is accessible to both cultures and sounds good with Rowan. I also don’t like many of the usual suggestions for crossover names (Jay/Jai, Nikhil/Nik, Hari/Harry, AJ/Ajay, Sam/Sameer, Vik/Vikram, etc)

Top contenders right now are:
Rishi – Indian name but easy to pronounce by everyone. Would it be weird if one child has an Indian name and the other does not? Also, if we choose this name, do we give the baby a western middle name? We also discussed Reece, which sounds a little similar to Rishi, but my husband prefers Rishi as he associates Reece with the actress Reese Witherspoon and finds it too feminine
Kieran – Kiran is an Indian name, so it is similar to Rohan/Rowan in that it sounds the same but spelled differently. But we’re not Irish, so would it be strange if both of our kids have Irish names? We’ve also floated the idea of Kirin or Kian instead. We have a close relative (female) named Kiran, so I’m not sure if using the Indian spelling is an option
Archer (Archie for short) – I love this name, but my husband isn’t crazy about it. He associates Archie with the comic, which was very popular in India when he was growing up. I think Archer would be easy to pronounce and similar to Indian names like Archana, Archan, Archit
Damian – Not really an Indian name but I’ve found a few websites that say it has Sanskrit origins. It’s my least favorite of the four because I find it to be a little long with three syllables and no clear nickname, but husband really likes this name

I think I could be talked into any of these names, but none of them stand out as the perfect one. I would love your suggestions on other options and thoughts on these.

Thanks in advance for your help!

My favorite is Kieran. I like the way it echoes what you did last time with Rowan/Rohan. And I think Celtic names are mainstream enough in the U.S. that it doesn’t seem odd if someone has a couple of them in a non-Celtic family.

Update on Baby Boy Smith, Brother to Zane and Julian

Hello!

My husband and I are expecting our third boy in a few months. We are struggling with names for this little one. Our first two boys were relatively easy to name, but we’ve found nothing that feels right with this little one.

Our surname is Anderson and we currently have a Wyatt James and a Monroe Alexander. Since we have an extremely common last name for our state, we’ve tried to choose names that are not as common, but still names people have heard before. We have not chosen a first or middle name, as we find middle names are easier when a first name is selected.

Names we’ve considered are Nolan, Selby, Ellis, and Felix.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Of the four you mention, I particularly like Nolan, Selby, and Ellis: I like the surnamey feeling with Wyatt and Monroe.

Selby is a name I haven’t encountered before, and I find I like to say it. I wonder if you would like Crosby.

I like the way Selby and Ellis bring in entirely new sounds. My one hesitation with Nolan is that it repeats some of the sounds from Monroe—not at dealbreaker levels, but just enough to catch my ear. I wonder if you’d like Calvin? It’s similar to Nolan but less similar to Monroe.

My one hesitation with Ellis is the way it flows into Anderson: it could sound like Ella Sanderson. I think for me that would be a dealbreaker.

Similar to Ellis are Davis and Harris and Hollis. They have a similar flow issue, but Dava and Hara and Holla are not as easily mistaken for first names.

Oh, maybe Keaton? Keaton Anderson. Wyatt, Monroe, and Keaton.

Update on Baby Girl Fightiss-with-a-W, Sister to Ann (Annie)