Boomer Names Growing Old Too (Sorry, Cheryl, Lisa, and Barbara!)

Is your name the equivalent of Doris, Mildred, or Gladys, tying you forever to a particular generation? Those popular names from the 1920s seem 'old' now, but 'hot' names from the 1940s through the 1960s sound just as dated to younger people today.

To see how closely tied names are to their era, take a quick quiz. Match the name below to the year when it was one of the five most popular given new baby boys or girls. Your choices for year are 1926 (turned 80 this year), 1946, 1966, and 1981 (turned 25):

1) Kimberly
2) Jason
3) Dorothy
4) Richard
5) Barbara
6) Charles

(answers at the end of this article)

It's not too hard to figure out a person's generation by their name (at least for girls). Boomers may not realize it, but their names have fallen far out of fashion.

In a recent article syndicated by the Baltimore Sun, reporter Linell Smith wrote that "... boomer names are not only older but also what cultural anthropologist Robbie ("officially a Robert") Blinkoff calls 'vanilla and middle-of-the-road.'" He quotes a 28 year old who says of the names Gary, Sandy, Joan, and Pat "you're naming my managers and bosses."

Just what were those names? For baby girls, 1946 brought a lot of:

#1 Mary (now #73)
#2 Linda (now #416)
#3 Patricia (#358)
#4 Barbara (#715)
#5 Carol (#753)

Barbara and Carol: like it or not, people peg your age by just your name.

Boys names don't go through the same cycles as girls' names. Many of the most popular boys names of 1946 are still doing fairly well today:

#1 James (now #17)
#2 Robert (#39)
#3 John (#18)
#4 William (#11)
#5 Richard (#93)

Twenty years later -- two years after the official end of the Baby Boom -- none of the 1946 girl's names were in the top five. For 1966 they were:

#1 Lisa (now #493),
#2 Kimberly (#63),
#3 Mary (#73),
#4 Michelle (#74),
#5 Karen (#164)

Again, the boys names are still in the top 50 today: #1 Michael is #2 now, #2 David is #14, #3 James is #17, #4 John is #18, #5 Robert is #39.

Most of all, pity the Cheryls of the world. The 19th most popular girl's name of the 1950's -- over 171,300 Cheryls were born in that decade -- is gone from the 2005 top 1,000 girl's name list, meaning that less than 300 baby Cheryls were born last year out of about 2 million girl births.

Other popular girls names of the 1950's have also (almost) fallen off the charts:

Debra - was #7, now #987
Diane - was #17, now #906
Donna - was #10, now #830 (301 girls named Donna were born in 2005)
Carol - was #16, now #753 (346 girl babies in 2005)
Barbara - was #6, now #715 (375 girl babies in 2005)
Deborah - was #5, now #662 (412 girl babies in 2005)
Pamela - was #13, now #619 (447 girl babies in 2005)
Susan - was #4, now #609 (460 girl babies in 2005)
Sharon - was #14, now #579 (487 girl babies in 2005)
Janet - was #20, now #556 (504 girl babies in 2005)

If you think "I'm a Cheryl, and that's not an old name!," what's your reaction to Dorothy or Betty? Those were two of the top five girl names from 1926, a generation prior to you.

The Jennifers of the world (#1 most popular in 1981, and #1 for the '70s) may think "Cheryl -- that's my mom's generation" ... but they should hold their tongue. Jennifer is now only the #42 most popular name and is fading fast. Right with them: Amanda (was #3, now #80) and Melissa (was #5, now #104).

And in twenty years we can write this same piece about Jacob and Madison (most popular names of this decade so far).

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If you want to see how Jennifer, or your name, stacks up on a cool dynamic chart, go to the best baby name trend site on the web: Baby Name Wizard's NameVoyager. The source for most of the data in this post is the Social Security Administration's Baby Name website.

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Other interesting-but-useless information we compiled while researching this post:

The top five names for baby girls in 1926, and where they ranked in 2005:

#1 Mary (now #73)
#2 Dorothy (#864)
#3 Betty (#918)
#4 Helen (#330)
#5 Margaret (#151)

Eighty year old men don't have the same problem with names going out of fashion -- some of the top 1926 names are still popular today:

#1 Robert (now #39)
#2 John (#18)
#3 James (#17)
#4 William (#11)
#5 Charles (#56)

For babies born in 1981:

#1 Jennifer (now #42)
#2 Jessica (#27)
#3 Amanda (#80)
#4 Sarah (#15)
#5 Melissa (#104)

#1 Michael (#2)
#2 Christopher (#9)
#3 Matthew (#4)
#4 Jason (#51)
#5 David (#14)

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Answers to the quiz:

1) Kimberly was the #2 girl's name in 1966;
2) Jason was #4 for boys in 1981;
3) Dorothy was #2 for girls in 1926;
4) Richard was #5 for boys in 1946;
5) Barbara was #4 for girls in 1946;
6) Charles was #5 for boys in 1926.