Did You Know?

The Social Security online site is a very user friendly tool. Besides the regular forms and bits of information, you can also see some trivia! Check out... http://ssa-custhelp.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/ssa.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=341

What are the most popular names given to babies?

Answer:
Every year, SSA's Office of the Actuary does a study of the most popular names given to applicants who were born in the current year.

The top ten boys names in 2006 are:
Jacob, Michael, Joshua, Ethan, Matthew, Daniel, Christopher, Andrew, Anthony, and William.

The top ten girls names for 2006 are:
Emily, Emma, Madison, Isabella, Ava, Abigail, Olivia, Hannah, Sophia, and Samantha.

The most popular names of twins born in 2006 are:
Jacob and Joshua; Matthew and Michael; Daniel and David; Ella and Emma; Isaac and Isaiah; Madison and Morgan; Landon and Logan; Taylor and Tyler; Brandon and Bryan; and Christian and Christopher.

You can actually even see the Popularity of a Name. How they explain it is "To see how the popularity of a name has changed over time, enter the name and, optionally, the sex and number of years. Please note that the name you select must be in the top 1000 most popular names in order for the name to appear in the table produced by your request."

You can also see Popular Names by Birth Year (any year after 1879). So in 1960, you would find that David and Mary topped the list while 1970 and 1980 had Michael and Jennifer at the top of the list. By 1990, Michael was still the most popular boy's name while Jessica took the top spot for girls names. Michael was the most popular name from 1954 to 1998 except for one year, 1960 when David took the lead. Jennifer was the most girls popular name from 1970-1984. Thinking about how many Jennifer's you know, does this surprise you?

You can also see by state. In 2006 in Texas, Emma and Mia took the top spots. Michigan had Ava and Emma; South Carolina had Madison and Emma and New Mexico had Isabella and Alyssa. For boys, Alaska had James while Arizona had Angel; Michigan had Jacob, South Carolina had William; and Massachusetts had Matthew.

There is even a game!
Is there a trend to name children after cities? Just a few years ago, the name "London" was not in the top 1000 baby names, but in 2006 the rank was 353 (for girls). Similarly, the name "Paris" has become popular. These 2 examples are European cities that have become popular baby names in the United States.
But what about U. S. cities?
Play the City Name Quiz!
From the list of United States cities with populations of 100,000 or more (as provided by the U. S. Census Bureau), we have drawn those names that are in the top 1000 names for births in 2006.
Can you guess 5 of them?

I had three correct: Dallas, Austin and Madison. There are 20 possible correct answers and let me tell you that not all of them are of the modern variety (i.e. Dakota, Georgia if you were to use states).
You try...http://www.socialsecurity.gov/cgi-bin/citynames.cgi

Just a little fun from the Office of Social Security!