Were You Named After Someone?

My dad named all of us. My brothers and I were all named after a president or statesman, and not necessarily the best ones: Grant, Franklin, Hoover, and McKinley. Our middle names are family names, grandfathers and uncles. He named my little sister sort of a traditional hyphenated Irish name, Kathrine-Margret.

Oddly, except for my brother, Grant, dad always called all of us by a nick-name, so we were Grant, Mick (me), Hoove, Mack (or sometimes Max), and Bonnie. I didn't even know my name was Franklin until I was about 12. I found out at school, when I had to go see the principal about chronically fighting on the playground. (my happy thought was, "You've got the wrong guy!" :p)

I insisted on going by Frank when I was 15, but my dad still called me Mick, and so do my siblings.
 

Lee said:
Were You Named After Someone?
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Not my first name, Robert, that is so common it could have been anyone.

However my middle name is Eric, which my parents always said was for the viking Eric the Red however our only claim to viking accessory seems to be via the British Isles.

My grandson's middle name is Robert, supposedly for me.

My last name is supposed to be a long past variant of Hennessey, useful if it would get me some of their whisky.
 
Well, sort of. My sneaky mom and her older sister were expecting their babies around the same time. My aunt had selected the name, 'Pamela' if she was to have a daughter. I was born first and my mother stole my aunt's selected name. End of story.

Oh, my aunt never forgave my mom. LOL By the way, my cousin was named, 'Peggy'. We still laugh about the name stealing.
 
I was named after my Dad's best friend from the 1st Marine Division, who was killed on Guadalcanal.

My Grandfather's first name was Houston.
My Dad's first name was Mitchell and his middle name was Houston.
My middle name is Mitchell.
My youngest son's first name is Mitchell, after my father.
 

Were You Named After Someone?​

In some cultures, it's customary for a parent to name the new infant after the first thing that is looked at the moment the birth is completed.
I'm relieved to say that that was not the practice for my parents, well, I was told by my old Grannie, that the moment that I popped into the world, the dog pooped on the rug in front of the fire. 😊
 
My paternal grandfather died before I was born. His name was Herbert. My father wanted to honour him by calling me, his first born, Herbert. My mother was having none of it, but she didn't say so much that her husband, my father, would comprehend, feminine guile and all that. Mother had a crush on the actor of the day, one, Robert Taylor.
robert-taylor-3.jpg
Actually his name was, Spangler Arlington Brugh, not exactly an imaginatively name that rolls off the tongue. But that didn't worry my mother. "Oh you can't call him Herbert," she argued, "it's so Victorian." "Well what did you have in mind?" Dad asked. "Something fresh like Robin," my mother suggested, keeping touching distance to the Robert that she so wanted.

At the time, and although TV in the UK was in it's infancy, a female presenter on TV, name of Robyn, was famous throughout the UK. "Robin?" my Dad replied, "he'll be teased mercilessly." Mother looked suitably chastised, Dad softened, "look," he said, "why don't we compromise?" Mother smiled, an inward smile, she knew where this was going. "Compromise?" She replied, "on what?" "His name." said Dad, "you like Robyn, and I really like the tribute of my father's name of Herbert, so let's compromise and call him Robert." "R-O-B of Robin and E-R-T of Herbert." "Oh what a good idea," said mother, who had contrived the compromise all along.

What I haven't said is that my family name is Taylor, but chances are, you've probably guessed that. So, that's how I became known as: "Robert Taylor."
 
Like others here, our family names come from grandparents and relatives. In our tradition, names of first-born boys and girls always go by that pattern. If you're a middle child, like me, and the grandparents' names are already taken, then anything goes. I was named after my aunt (dad's sister) who went by an Ancient Greek name, and when I was growing up, the kids used to call me Patty Duke because it was easier to say than the Greek version. I was ok with that. But I never did like it when they called me "Pat.":p
 
Jace said:
A very common name, at the time...so, when I "got to school"..
Here were a zillion of us.!🤗
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My name isn't unusual ... but it's not the most common either, and I was the only girl in my school of over a thousand kids, with this name , so I hated it with a passion because it made me stand out, and I absolutely didn't want that, even today I hardly ever hear any kids or girls called by my name, and yet if I told you what it was you'd be amazed that there aren't more of us..:LOL:
 
Alligatorob said:
Not my first name, Robert, that is so common it could have been anyone.

However my middle name is Eric, which my parents always said was for the viking Eric the Red however our only claim to viking accessory seems to be via the British Isles.

My grandson's middle name is Robert, supposedly for me.

My last name is supposed to be a long past variant of Hennessey, useful if it would get me some of their whisky.
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Eric enjoyed the most popularity in the United States from the mid-sixties to the late eighties. In those years it stayed consistently on the top 25 list of most popular names for boys. The peak of its popularity was in 1970. In that year, 23,574 babies were named Eric.
 
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