One of Paul Simon‘s biggest hits was a song titled “You Can Call Me Al.”  But, really, who calls anyone Al anymore? 　　Once upon a time, a century ago or so, Al was almost as commonplace a nickname as Joe or Jim, Bill or Bob.  Al itself stood independently at Number 298,  a casual...

　　Yesterday we did a rundown on the divide between the girls’ names that are stylish to the point where it feels like they must be popular and those that are actually, statistically widely used.  It’s especially hard to distinguish when it comes to the names we see appearing so often in berry...

　　Last week we took a look at the ladies in limbo, the girls’ names not old enough to fall under the Hundred Year Rule, but were most popular from the 1920s to the 1960s, to question whether any of them were eligible for resuscitation. 　　And now, as promised we perform the...

　　This week, for her Nameberry 9, Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel picks the newsiest names on the boys’ side of the gender divide. 　　Midway through compiling this week’s list, I realized just how many great boys’ names are out there. 　　This is a subject of some debate.  Creativity in naming a...

　　What with the movie Ted, starring an outrageously potty-mouthed teddy bear, having been a box office sensation, and celebs giving their baby boys the actual first or middle name of Bear, this seems like a perfect time to think about Teddy and other fictional bear names for possible inspiration. 　　So,...

　　Just in case you’ve been agonizing about the lack of good names for boys, Appellation Mountain‘s Abby Sandel presents the case for cool boy names in this week’s The Nameberry 9. 　　Convinced there are no great names for boys? 　　Spend a few minutes on message boards and you’ll hear the laments. ...

　　The revelation of Tennessee as the name of Reese Witherspoon and Jim Toth’s baby boy came as something of a surprise to the celebrity babies‘ name-watching world—but perhaps it shouldn’t have been, what with other recent starkids named Alabama, Indiana and Arizona.  And a simple Google search will tell you that though...

　　Okay, you’re Berries, of course you wouldn’t. 　　On the other hand, if crowd-sourcing your baby’s name is good enough for the most powerful new mom in corporate America….. 　　Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer and venture capitalist husband Zack Bogue had their first baby, a boy, on Sunday, and took to Twitter...

　　Now it’s the boys’ turn at the Top 100 list.  These are the most popular names gauged by visitors to their pages so far in 2012. 　　As with the national list, the boys’ top names are more stable than the girls’ — though the Nameberry list is very different from...

　　The Theo family of names is moving on up, en masse. 　　The pater familias, Theodore, progressed thirty places this year on the Social Security list, rose 115% on Nameberry searches and was the only boy’s name to register more than once on our latest Quarterly Report, plus it’s been the...

　　After decades of classic Thomases and Timothys, Richards and Roberts, nothing sounded cooler in the sixties and seventies than a sleek, new, single-syllable name.  I’m not talking about those that were just short-form nicknames like Josh and Jeff and Brad and Greg, or the inauthentic Hollywood-invented names like Rock or...

　　Finn has taken over as Nameberry’s top boy name for 2012, claiming the Number 1 spot held last year by Asher.  Former most popular boys’ name Henry drops to Number 3. 　　The names on our boys’  Top 10 remain the same as last year, except that Owen and Felix have...

　　This week, Appellation Mountain’s Abby Sandel finds boys’ names that are anything but traditional, and wonders if nickname-free is the new priority when naming a son. 　　Flip through on an old high school yearbook, and you’ll probably find pictures of William “Billy” Jones and Mary “Mimi” Smith. 　　For generations, there...