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Babies Named for First Transpacific Flight
Two babies born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on June 29, 1927, were named Maitland. Why? Because pilot Lt. Lester Maitland had just landed in Honolulu after piloting the very first transpacific flight from the...
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Wife Sends Husband to Jail over Baby Name
Here’s a bizarre tale for you. Alfred Johnson of Chicago took his wife, Alice, to divorce court in 1943 after she’d had him arrested 12 different times over the course of their 24-year marriage. The...
View ArticleBaby Name from Honeymoon Locations
From a 1923 issue of the Boston Globe: Mr. and Mrs. Frank Sole of Newark N. J. named their baby after the cities they visited on their honeymoon. Francisco Washington Boston Newark Sole is the burden...
View ArticleBaby Boy in Turkey Named Railroad
From a short article printed in several newspapers in mid-1929: This Anatolian city [Konya] wins the prize for “modernization” with the recent bestowal upon a boy of the name of “Railroad.” He was born...
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French Airplane Baby, b. 1922, Named Guynemer
Many moons ago, I wrote about Airlene. She was born in an airplane in 1929. Many of the sources I consulted for that post explicitly stated that Airlene was the first baby born in an airplane. I hadn’t...
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San Francisco Baby Named for Graf Zeppelin
In August of 1929, the 775-foot, hydrogen-filled LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin became the first lighter-than-air craft to circle the globe. The rigid airship traveled from Lakehurst (New Jersey) to...
View ArticleHemingway’s Son Named for Bullfighter
Ernest Hemingway and his first wife, Hadley Richardson, welcomed their only child in October of 1923. The baby boy was named John Hadley Nicanor Hemingway. The name Nicanor was inspired by Spanish...
View ArticleBaby Named for Jack Dempsey
Boxing’s first million-dollar gate was the match between American boxer Jack Dempsey and French boxer Georges Carpentier that took place in New Jersey on July 2, 1921. That morning, a baby boy was born...
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Baby Named George Fried for Famous Sea Captain
Baby born at sea in 1929:George Fried ChojnowskiCapt. George Fried (1877-1949) was responsible for not one but two heroic Atlantic rescues during his career at sea. (He was also one of the few people...
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Where Did Lido “Lee” Iacocca Get His Name?
Businessman Lido Anthony “Lee” Iacocca was born in Pennsylvania in 1924 to Italian immigrants Nicola “Nick” Iacocca and Antonietta Perrotta. Lee Iacocca went on to become the president of Ford Motor...
View ArticleBaby Named for Judge Who Granted Divorce
In 1928, the Aberdeen Journal mentioned a London woman who had been granted a separation from her husband by London Magistrate Basil B. Watson. She was apparently very pleased about the decision,...
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Why Was Marilyn Monroe Named “Norma Jeane” at Birth?
We already know how Marilyn Monroe, born Norma Jeane Mortenson, came up with her stage name — “Marilyn” was from Marilyn Miller, and “Monroe” was her mother’s maiden name. But why was she named “Norma...
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Name Change: Joyce to Antonia
King VidorMovie director King W. Vidor [pronounced vee-dor] and his second wife, Eleanor Boardman, welcomed their first child together in November of 1927. They had a name picked out for a boy —...
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The Namesakes of Huey P. Long
Yesterday’s name, Broderick, was popularized by a movie based on the life of populist politician Huey P(ierce) Long, nicknamed “The Kingfish,” who served as Governor of Louisiana (1928-1932), U.S....
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The Ephemeral Mateel
Kansas newspaper editor Edgar Watson “E. W.” Howe published his first novel, The Story of a Country Town, in his own newspaper, the Atchison Daily Globe, in 1883. Encyclopedia Britannica said the novel...
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Neva, Not Named for Nevada
Actress Neva Patterson, mentioned in yesterday’s post about Diana Lynn, was born in 1920 on a farm near Nevada [neh-VAY-duh], Iowa. So she must have been named for her birthplace, right? Nope. Neva,...
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