The Least Popular Baby Names...and Why

The most popular baby names in 2010 were Aiden for a boy and Sophia for a girl (those names knocked Jacob and Isabella off their thrones.)

But what were the least popular names? Well, scanning the list at the Circle of Moms website, I was really surprised not to find my own name on there, simply because of when I was born.

As it is, the list is a roll call of many of my contemporaries...friends, relatives and acquaintances that were born in the mid to late 50's and early 60s.

According to Circle of Moms:

"...the least favorite girls names are largely names that were once incredibly popular—in the late 1930s-1960s, but which have now fallen drastically out of favor. According to the Social Security Administration's name data:

• Patricia was in the top 5 girls names from the late 1930s through early 1950s,
• Susan was a top 5 name from the late 1940s through the early 1960s
• Nancy and Sandra were both top 10 names throughout the 1940s, andPamela and Brenda ranked among the top 20 most popular girls names during the 1950s and early 60s

On the boys' side, a similar trend holds: Again according to Social Security Administration's name data, Larry was a top 10 name from 1937-55, and Roger hovered around #25 for the entire duration of the 40s. Names ending with “-arry” (as in Larry, Jerry, and Harry) were also especially popular in the 1950s but are no longer trendy. In 2010, not a single “-erry” ending name made the boys' top 50 names list.

...Apparently many modern moms have an antipathy for names strongly associated with much older generations."

Go here to read the complete list of least popular baby names.

Don't forget, though--baby naming trends come and go. I remember my Grandma Garrett once told me that she was terribly embarrassed that her father's name was Joshua--she thought it was such an old-fashioned name!

And then there are those names that never seem to go out of style. I noticed that "Katherine" and "David" are still on the top 100 favorites...as are the names of my grown-up sons, Jonathan and Justin.

If you're expecting a baby, what names are you considering?

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