yeoldenews
Ye Olde News
A bored researcher's celebration of old newspapers/documents/ephemera and the people, stories and humor found therein. Currently reading and transcribing my way through a collection of over a thousand late Victorian letters I purchased at a flea market.
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Yet another selection of some of the better names I've come across in Regency era newspapers recently.
#some clarification on which of these are long s's or fs since the newsprint can be a bit blurry at times...#ChicheSter - SfaFto - BoSworth - SwinglehurSt#names#history#regency#regency era#dnd character names#1790s#1800s#1810s
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I found something fascinating and I was wondering if you'd come across any of these: https://youtu.be/vlurcp_qiSg?si=dDyD0jQ6C2X5DXFh
(The link goes to a YouTube video by Dime Store Adventures about the story behind the linotype keysmash "etaoin shrdlu" that often appears as a typo in old newspapers.)
I have definitely seen these around from time to time, but didn't know the phrase had such a cult following in newspaper printing lore.
That was very interesting! Thanks for the link.
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The craziest nickname i know of even more of of leftfield than Peg for Margaret, is Tuck for William. Can you explain where that one came from?
While I've seen a few scattered Williams who go by Tuck, I've never seen any formal association with the name William.
I feel like English has too many terms for nicknames (diminutive, hypocorism, sobriquet, pet name, etc.) which either have no firm definitions, or they have definitions that largely overlap - which leads to a lot of confusion as to exactly what type of nickname you're talking about.
For example: my given name is Samantha, but my family calls me Sissy. Sissy is my (a person named Samantha's) nickname, but that doesn't mean Sissy is a nickname for Samantha.
So while Tuck may be a person named William's nickname, it isn't a nickname for William (at least not that I've ever come across).
And Peg may seem odd, but it's actually pretty straight-forward linguistically:
Margaret was shortened Marg, Marg became Mag due to many British dialects lacking rhoticity, Mag became Meg as a result of the Great Vowel Shift, and Meg rhymes with Peg and people really, really like rhyming stuff.
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Did Jack not come from the French version of john 'Jaques'?
This is a centuries' old scholarly debate, the short answer of which is most likely no.
First off a correction - Jacques is actually the French form of James, not John (which is Jean).
There appears to have been some discussion in the 19th century as to whether Jack may have originated as a nickname for James and only became associated with John later on (much as Hank originated as a nickname for John before it became associated with Henry) - but later research seems to discount this theory.
The seminal work on this subject is a paper/booklet titled The Pedigree of 'Jack' and of Various Allied Names written by English librarian E. W. B. Nicholson in 1892.
In his research Nicholson found "no recorded instance of Jack, Jak, Jacke or Jakke ever being used to represent Jacques or James".
That being said - names don't develop in a vacuum, nor in laboratory conditions. It's entirely possible that Medieval Englishmen being exposed to the name Jacques influenced the shortening of Jackin to Jack - but short of a time machine trip to ask someone why they chose to go by Jack and not Jackin, it's kind of impossible to prove one way or another.
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That is amazing!
I'm very curious if your Achilles is the same one I posted as there were a truly shocking number of Achilles Death(e)rages running around in early 19th century America. The source of the clipping I used was from a legal summons from Stokes County, North Carolina printed in 1823 in the Western Carolinian newspaper (printed in Salisbury, NC) - however the summons states that Mr. Deathrage "does not reside within the limits of the state".
Either way, A+ naming choices @ryujin1066's great (6th) grandparents.
Another selection of some of the better names I've come across in Regency era newspapers recently.
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i recently came across some newspapers my family kept from the 1950s-- i'd love to scan them and donate the papers, but i'm not sure how to go about looking for historians who'd be interested. do you have any advice?
The first thing I'd do is dig around online just to double check that they haven't already been digitized. There have been some HUGE newspaper digitization projects just in the last five years or so, and new newspapers are being put up online pretty much every day.
Searching for "location + title of newspaper + "newspaper archives"" should give you a good idea of what's already been done. Even if the sites are pay-to-access they usually let you do a search for free.
The US, Australia and New Zealand all have ongoing national digitization projects you can also check.
If you're in the US/Canada, the majority of states/provinces have their own digitization projects where you can find additional information. (Just search for State/Province name + "newspaper archives").
If it doesn't look like the papers you have have been digitized anywhere - these projects (especially the state-level ones) would be a good place to contact. Oftentimes they have dozens of newspapers that are still waiting to be scanned, so it's also possible they do have copies even if they aren't online yet. If they don't have any copies of the newspaper issues you have, they may be interested in them.
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Another selection of some of the better names I've come across in Regency era newspapers recently.
#names#history#1790s#1800s#1810s#regency#regency era#yesterday I came across a 'Pleasant Cowmeadow' which I really wanted to include but it's handwritten in not the most legible handwriting
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An excerpt from the trial of Elinor Crane, who was arrested in Middlesex in 1693 on suspicion of burglary. A witness claimed one of the burglars was a woman in men's clothing, and Elinor had previously been seen in the area dressed as a man.
"But the Court asking her why she went in Mans Apparel, the Prisoner replyed, She went to Wooe a Widow. Upon the whole Matter the Jury brought her in not Guilty."
(source: Old Bailey Proceedings: Accounts of Criminal Trials, April 26, 1693.)
#'why were you wearing pants?' 'hot milfs in my area' 'understandable - next case'#history#17th century#1690s#crime history#lgbtq+ history#gender roles#things I find while researching other things
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I came across the word "swaggereth" in a book from 1622 last night and felt like it should be shared with the world.
"Hee swaggereth, as though the whole Towne were his owne."
(source: Adagia in Latine and English, Erasmus, 1622.)
#honestly google english men's fashion in the 1620s#he swaggereth deservedly#history#1620s#english language#jacobean#swag#linguistics#things i find while researching other things
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While we’re on the subject of names, is there an explanation for how traditional nicknames came about that are seemingly unrelated to, or have little in common with, the original name?
ie- John/Jack, Richard/Dick, Henry/Harry/Hank, Charles/Chuck, Margaret/Peggy/Daisy, Sarah/Sally, Mary/Molly, Anne/Nan, etc
I am actually over a week into researching a huge follow-up post (probably more than one if I’m being honest) about the history of nickname usage, so I will be going into this in much, much more detail at a hopefully not-so-later date - if I have not lost my mind. (Two days ago I spent three hours chasing down a source lead that turned out to be a typographical error from 1727 that was then quoted in source after source for the next 150 years.)
As a preview though, here’s some info about the names you mentioned:
The origins of a good portion of common English nicknames come down to the simple fact that people really, really like rhyming things. Will 🠞Bill, Rob🠞Bob, Rick🠞Dick, Meg🠞Peg.
It may seem like a weird reason, but how many of you have known an Anna/Hannah-Banana? I exclusively refer to my Mom’s cat as Toes even though her name is Moe (Moesie-Toesies 🠞 Toesies 🠞 Toes).
Jack likely evolved from the use of the Middle English diminutive suffix “-chen” - pronounced (and often spelled) “-kyn” or “kin”. The use of -chen as a diminutive suffix still endures in modern German - as in “liebchen” = sweetheart (lieb “love” + -chen).
John (Jan) 🠞 Jankin 🠞 Jackin 🠞 Jack.
Hank was also originally a nickname for John from the same source. I and J were not distinct letters in English until the 17th Century. “Iankin” would have been nearly indistinguishable in pronunciation from “Hankin” due to H-dropping. It’s believed to have switched over to being a nickname for Henry in early Colonial America due to the English being exposed to the Dutch nickname for Henrik - “Henk”.
Harry is thought to be a remnant of how Henry was pronounced up until the early modern era. The name was introduced to England during the Norman conquest as the French Henri (On-REE). The already muted nasal n was dropped in the English pronunciation. With a lack of standardized spelling, the two names were used interchangeably in records throughout the middle ages. So all the early English King Henrys would have written their name Henry and pronounced it Harry.
Sally and Molly likely developed simply because little kids can’t say R’s or L’s. Mary 🠞 Mawy 🠞 Molly. Sary 🠞 Sawy 🠞 Sally.
Daisy became a nickname for Margaret because in French garden daisies are called marguerites.
Nan for Anne is an example of a very cool linguistic process called rebracketing, where two words that are often said/written together transfer letters/morphemes over time. The English use of “an” instead of “a” before words beginning with vowels is a common cause of rebracketing. For example: the Middle English “an eute” became “a newt”, and “a napron” became “an apron”. In the case of nicknames the use of the archaic possessive “mine” is often the culprit. “Mine Anne” over time became “My Nan” as “mine” fell out of use. Ned and Nell have the same origin.
Oddly enough the word “nickname” is itself a result of rebracketing, from the Middle English “an eke (meaning additional) name”.
I realized earlier this week that my cat (Toe’s sister) also has a rebracketing nickname. Her name is Mina, but I call her Nom Nom - formed by me being very annoying and saying her name a bunch of time in a row - miNAMiNAMiNAM.
Chuck is a very modern (20th century) nickname which I’ll have to get back to you on as I started my research in the 16th century and am only up to the 1810s so far lol.
#names#nicknames#onomastics#history#asks#nicknames are really hard to research you guys#there is so much info out there and it's almost all nonsense#and I'm talking academic books with listed sources not buzzfeed listicles#some guy in the 18th century forgetting to mention Bill on a list of common nicknames does not mean it wasn't in use at the time ma dude#i've had to get very creative with sources#god bless word for word murder trial testimony
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A Guide to Historically Accurate Regency-Era Names
I recently received a message from a historical romance writer asking if I knew any good resources for finding historically accurate Regency-era names for their characters.
Not knowing any off the top of my head, I dug around online a bit and found there really isn’t much out there. The vast majority of search results were Buzzfeed-style listicles which range from accurate-adjacent to really, really, really bad.
I did find a few blog posts with fairly decent name lists, but noticed that even these have very little indication as to each name’s relative popularity as those statistical breakdowns really don't exist.
I began writing up a response with this information, but then I (being a research addict who was currently snowed in after a blizzard) thought hey - if there aren’t any good resources out there why not make one myself?
As I lacked any compiled data to work from, I had to do my own data wrangling on this project. Due to this fact, I limited the scope to what I thought would be the most useful for writers who focus on this era, namely - people of a marriageable age living in the wealthiest areas of London.
So with this in mind - I went through period records and compiled the names of 25,000 couples who were married in the City of Westminster (which includes Mayfair, St. James and Hyde Park) between 1804 to 1821.
So let’s see what all that data tells us…
To begin - I think it’s hard for us in the modern world with our wide and varied abundance of first names to conceive of just how POPULAR popular names of the past were.
If you were to take a modern sample of 25-year-old (born in 1998) American women, the most common name would be Emily with 1.35% of the total population. If you were to add the next four most popular names (Hannah, Samantha, Sarah and Ashley) these top five names would bring you to 5.5% of the total population. (source: Social Security Administration)
If you were to do the same survey in Regency London - the most common name would be Mary with 19.2% of the population. Add the next four most popular names (Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah and Jane) and with just 5 names you would have covered 62% of all women.
To hit 62% of the population in the modern survey it would take the top 400 names.
The top five Regency men’s names (John, William, Thomas, James and George) have nearly identical statistics as the women’s names.
I struggled for the better part of a week with how to present my findings, as a big list in alphabetical order really fails to get across the popularity factor and also isn’t the most tumblr-compatible format. And then my YouTube homepage recommended a random video of someone ranking all the books they’d read last year - and so I present…
The Regency Name Popularity Tier List
The Tiers
S+ - 10% of the population or greater. There is no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. 52% of the population had one of these 7 names.
S - 2-10%. There is still no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. Names in this percentage range in the past have included Mary and William in the 1880s and Jennifer in the late 1970s (topped out at 4%).
A - 1-2%. The top five modern names usually fall in this range. Kids with these names would probably include their last initial in class to avoid confusion. (1998 examples: Emily, Sarah, Ashley, Michael, Christopher, Brandon.)
B - .3-1%. Very common names. Would fall in the top 50 modern names. You would most likely know at least 1 person with these names. (1998 examples: Jessica, Megan, Allison, Justin, Ryan, Eric)
C - .17-.3%. Common names. Would fall in the modern top 100. You would probably know someone with these names, or at least know of them. (1998 examples: Chloe, Grace, Vanessa, Sean, Spencer, Seth)
D - .06-.17%. Less common names. In the modern top 250. You may not personally know someone with these names, but you’re aware of them. (1998 examples: Faith, Cassidy, Summer, Griffin, Dustin, Colby)
E - .02-.06%. Uncommon names. You’re aware these are names, but they are not common. Unusual enough they may be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Calista, Skye, Precious, Fabian, Justice, Lorenzo)
F - .01-.02%. Rare names. You may have heard of these names, but you probably don’t know anyone with one. Extremely unusual, and would likely be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Emerald, Lourdes, Serenity, Dario, Tavian, Adonis)
G - Very rare names. There are only a handful of people with these names in the entire country. You’ve never met anyone with this name.
H - Virtually non-existent. Names that theoretically could have existed in the Regency period (their original source pre-dates the early 19th century) but I found fewer than five (and often no) period examples of them being used in Regency England. (Example names taken from romance novels and online Regency name lists.)
Just to once again reinforce how POPULAR popular names were before we get to the tier lists - statistically, in a ballroom of 100 people in Regency London: 80 would have names from tiers S+/S. An additional 15 people would have names from tiers A/B and C. 4 of the remaining 5 would have names from D/E. Only one would have a name from below tier E.
Women's Names
S+ Mary, Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah
S - Jane, Mary Ann+, Hannah, Susannah, Margaret, Catherine, Martha, Charlotte, Maria
A - Frances, Harriet, Sophia, Eleanor, Rebecca
B - Alice, Amelia, Bridget~, Caroline, Eliza, Esther, Isabella, Louisa, Lucy, Lydia, Phoebe, Rachel, Susan
C - Ellen, Fanny*, Grace, Henrietta, Hester, Jemima, Matilda, Priscilla
D - Abigail, Agnes, Amy, Augusta, Barbara, Betsy*, Betty*, Cecilia, Christiana, Clarissa, Deborah, Diana, Dinah, Dorothy, Emily, Emma, Georgiana, Helen, Janet^, Joanna, Johanna, Judith, Julia, Kezia, Kitty*, Letitia, Nancy*, Ruth, Winifred>
E - Arabella, Celia, Charity, Clara, Cordelia, Dorcas, Eve, Georgina, Honor, Honora, Jennet^, Jessie*^, Joan, Joyce, Juliana, Juliet, Lavinia, Leah, Margery, Marian, Marianne, Marie, Mercy, Miriam, Naomi, Patience, Penelope, Philadelphia, Phillis, Prudence, Rhoda, Rosanna, Rose, Rosetta, Rosina, Sabina, Selina, Sylvia, Theodosia, Theresa
F - (selected) Alicia, Bethia, Euphemia, Frederica, Helena, Leonora, Mariana, Millicent, Mirah, Olivia, Philippa, Rosamund, Sybella, Tabitha, Temperance, Theophila, Thomasin, Tryphena, Ursula, Virtue, Wilhelmina
G - (selected) Adelaide, Alethia, Angelina, Cassandra, Cherry, Constance, Delilah, Dorinda, Drusilla, Eva, Happy, Jessica, Josephine, Laura, Minerva, Octavia, Parthenia, Theodora, Violet, Zipporah
H - Alberta, Alexandra, Amber, Ashley, Calliope, Calpurnia, Chloe, Cressida, Cynthia, Daisy, Daphne, Elaine, Eloise, Estella, Lilian, Lilias, Francesca, Gabriella, Genevieve, Gwendoline, Hermione, Hyacinth, Inez, Iris, Kathleen, Madeline, Maude, Melody, Portia, Seabright, Seraphina, Sienna, Verity
Men's Names
S+ John, William, Thomas
S - James, George, Joseph, Richard, Robert, Charles, Henry, Edward, Samuel
A - Benjamin, (Mother’s/Grandmother’s maiden name used as first name)#
B - Alexander^, Andrew, Daniel, David>, Edmund, Francis, Frederick, Isaac, Matthew, Michael, Patrick~, Peter, Philip, Stephen, Timothy
C - Abraham, Anthony, Christopher, Hugh>, Jeremiah, Jonathan, Nathaniel, Walter
D - Adam, Arthur, Bartholomew, Cornelius, Dennis, Evan>, Jacob, Job, Josiah, Joshua, Lawrence, Lewis, Luke, Mark, Martin, Moses, Nicholas, Owen>, Paul, Ralph, Simon
E - Aaron, Alfred, Allen, Ambrose, Amos, Archibald, Augustin, Augustus, Barnard, Barney, Bernard, Bryan, Caleb, Christian, Clement, Colin, Duncan^, Ebenezer, Edwin, Emanuel, Felix, Gabriel, Gerard, Gilbert, Giles, Griffith, Harry*, Herbert, Humphrey, Israel, Jabez, Jesse, Joel, Jonas, Lancelot, Matthias, Maurice, Miles, Oliver, Rees, Reuben, Roger, Rowland, Solomon, Theophilus, Valentine, Zachariah
F - (selected) Abel, Barnabus, Benedict, Connor, Elijah, Ernest, Gideon, Godfrey, Gregory, Hector, Horace, Horatio, Isaiah, Jasper, Levi, Marmaduke, Noah, Percival, Shadrach, Vincent
G - (selected) Albion, Darius, Christmas, Cleophas, Enoch, Ethelbert, Gavin, Griffin, Hercules, Hugo, Innocent, Justin, Maximilian, Methuselah, Peregrine, Phineas, Roland, Sebastian, Sylvester, Theodore, Titus, Zephaniah
H - Albinus, Americus, Cassian, Dominic, Eric, Milo, Rollo, Trevor, Tristan, Waldo, Xavier
# Men were sometimes given a family surname (most often their mother's or grandmother's maiden name) as their first name - the most famous example of this being Fitzwilliam Darcy. If you were to combine all surname-based first names as a single 'name' this is where the practice would rank.
*Rank as a given name, not a nickname
+If you count Mary Ann as a separate name from Mary - Mary would remain in S+ even without the Mary Anns included
~Primarily used by people of Irish descent
^Primarily used by people of Scottish descent
>Primarily used by people of Welsh descent
I was going to continue on and write about why Regency-era first names were so uniform, discuss historically accurate surnames, nicknames, and include a little guide to finding 'unique' names that are still historically accurate - but this post is already very, very long, so that will have to wait for a later date.
If anyone has any questions/comments/clarifications in the meantime feel free to message me.
Methodology notes: All data is from marriage records covering six parishes in the City of Westminster between 1804 and 1821. The total sample size was 50,950 individuals.
I chose marriage records rather than births/baptisms as I wanted to focus on individuals who were adults during the Regency era rather than newborns. I think many people make the mistake when researching historical names by using baby name data for the year their story takes place rather than 20 to 30 years prior, and I wanted to avoid that. If you are writing a story that takes place in 1930 you don’t want to research the top names for 1930, you need to be looking at 1910 or earlier if you are naming adult characters.
I combined (for my own sanity) names that are pronounced identically but have minor spelling differences: i.e. the data for Catherine also includes Catharines and Katherines, Susannah includes Susannas, Phoebe includes Phebes, etc.
The compound 'Mother's/Grandmother's maiden name used as first name' designation is an educated guesstimate based on what I recognized as known surnames, as I do not hate myself enough to go through 25,000+ individuals and confirm their mother's maiden names. So if the tally includes any individuals who just happened to be named Fitzroy/Hastings/Townsend/etc. because their parents liked the sound of it and not due to any familial relations - my bad.
I did a small comparative survey of 5,000 individuals in several rural communities in Rutland and Staffordshire (chosen because they had the cleanest data I could find and I was lazy) to see if there were any significant differences between urban and rural naming practices and found the results to be very similar. The most noticeable difference I observed was that the S+ tier names were even MORE popular in rural areas than in London. In Rutland between 1810 and 1820 Elizabeths comprised 21.4% of all brides vs. 15.3% in the London survey. All other S+ names also saw increases of between 1% and 6%. I also observed that the rural communities I surveyed saw a small, but noticeable and fairly consistent, increase in the use of names with Biblical origins.
Sources of the records I used for my survey:
Ancestry.com. England & Wales Marriages, 1538-1988 [database on-line].
Ancestry.com. Westminster, London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1935 [database on-line].
#history#regency#1800s#1810s#names#london#writing resources#regency romance#jane austen#bridgerton#bridgerton would be an exponentially better show if daphne's name was dorcas#behold - the reason i haven't posted in three weeks
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Hi I was wondering if you know of any good resources to get good vintage names that aren’t typical and boring (Fred, Edward, Alfred etc)?
Some of the names in the Santa letters are certainly peculiar and it made me wonder what kind of names those “vintage baby names” lists are leaving out 😜
Thanks! And happy new year 🎊
One place to get a good general overview of what names were like in a certain era is the Social Security Administration's lists of popular names that go back to the 1880s. The further down the lists you go the less common they get. However these are still all names that had at least a few hundred occurrences, so you're not going to have any Gloyds etc..
I personally always try to find names from primary sources (newspapers, census, vital records, etc.) as you're more likely to come across unusual names that don't make the top 200 lists.
Also keep in mind that name popularity varied greatly by location. Just because there were a bunch of Juanitas in Tulsa in 1930 doesn't mean there were that many in Boston.
Honestly if anyone is working on a specific project and needs names from a certain location/era (i.e. you're writing a novel that takes place in London in 1627) feel free to message me and I'd be happy to work with you to compile a list from primary sources. I love this stuff and will use any valid excuse to spend an evening digging through 17th century baptismal records.
#if you buy me a coffee I might even make you a simple custom name generator#I do this for myself all the time because I'm a party person who really likes spreadsheets#names#history#historical fiction#writing resources#asks#@sir-sleepalot#writing reference#character names
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Hi! Just wanted to show you the letter my 3 year old niece left for Santa this year - she is scared of the fact he comes into the house! Thought you would like it 😂🎄💝
This is absolutely adorable!
From what I've seen in letters, the fear of Santa seems to have been a fairly regular occurrence in the 3 to 5 year old demographic.
The specific fear of "Ho Ho Ho" is a first for me though lol
Thank you so much for sharing!
#sorry for not responding to this earlier#with the busy holidays it completely slipped my mind#@yellowginghamdream#asks#dear santa#kids
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Just saw your reblog of the Gladys Ditmars post. Thanks for adding so much great information! I work in the Library & Archives of the Bronx Zoo and we’re at the tail end of a huge film cataloging/digitization project. We have thousands of reels that have rarely been touched before now. A number of Raymond Ditmars films have survived and will be available to watch online when our project is finished. I thought you might like to know!
That's absolutely amazing!!! I am thrilled more libraries/archives are undertaking these huge digitization projects (and having done archival work in the past I know what a massive undertaking they are.) As a researcher, you guys are my heroes.
Thank you SO much for sharing this! I can't wait to see what treasures you uncover!
(link to the Gladys Ditmars post for those who haven't seen it)
#asks#@stringsofglass#archivist and librarians are my heroes#gladys ditmars#history#zoos#the bronx zoo#archival work
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For all my fellow name nerds out there, I am very pleased to present the second annual "Gloyd Roberson Memorial List of Actual Human Children Who Wrote Letters to Santa in 1920s/30s Oklahoma".
These aren’t all necessarily “weirder than Gloyd” but fall into three rough categories which I’ve dubbed: “that’s got a nice ring to it”, “if I used this in a novel it would be considered too unrealistic” and “you’ve got 5 seconds to name a character that lives in 1920s Oklahoma, GO!”:
Selvyn Atteberry
Dyer Banfield
Bert Baxter
Hilda Bender
Imogene Berry
Heloise Blakely
Burl Boyer
Clyda Pearl Boyington
Okal Brooks
Vada Jo Bricker
Deverett Brumley
Lee Roy Buck
Vivian May Burdue
Donnie Buster
Elmarie Button
Junior Buzzard
Melchor Caldex
Tycene Calhoun
Tiny Bell Callison
Dapalene Caywood
Edney Clopton
Buster Combs
Georgia Countryman
Vantruba Crockett
Alto Day
Buddie DeWayne
Violet Divine
Elwanda Downing
Cletys Durham
Thurlo Epps
Apple Fields
Floyd Fleetwood
Metherine Franklin
Ula Fay French
Wanda Jo Fronterhouse
Irline Fuller
Jack Gritzmaker
J. D. Grizzle
Billie Jean Gulley
Joline Hardcastle
Kaloolah Herrill
Thelias Hatfield
Elva Heavins
Coleman Hewlett
Helen Hillhouse
Virgil Holderby
Katymae Houston
Myree Huffstutlar
Estelline Hurrypack
Blondie Huhm
Lila Lou Jackson
Denver Jones
Vernell Lambert
Sonny Boy Lockart
Dinkey Long (autocorrect really wanted this to be Donkey Kong)
Bamma Lynn
Rep Madden
Standford Mann
Jack Mattingly
Goldia McGee
Madge Messinger
Mauzell Mullins
Jeffie Wayne Muskrat
Archibald Neighbors
Hazel Nickerson
Eulah Oakley
Lyle Oyler
Milburn Partain
Jackson Payne
Montana Phillips
Bobbie Dean Phoenix
Toots Putman
Madonna Mae Rickey
Cyprine Robertson
Juanelle Schneeberger
Billie Jean Sparks
Texanna Smith
Pansy Stetson
Patsy Ruth Stubblefield
Eldon Sweezy
Hoy Trotter
Pearl Vandorien
Leland Weems
Joe Bob West
Wayness Whitely
Buster Wyatt
John Ira Youngblood
Domby Zinn
#feel free to use for any western themed dnd campaigns#or dust bowl romance novels you may be writing#names#oklahoma#1920s#1930s#dnd#long post
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Thanks again for taking the time to share the "Dear Santa" letters. Reading them is a delight. It's become a bit of an informal tradition that I read them with my mom because she enjoys them, too. There were so many good ones this year, but if I had to choose a favorite, I think Patti's letter made me laugh the most.
Have a very merry Christmas, and best wishes for the new year! ♡
I love Patti so, so much. She's become a running gag with my family/friends.
On Christmas Eve my family always reads the same children's story we've been reading since I was a kid, but this year we changed the last line up a bit to "And so it is on Christmas Eve we gather to celebrate the birth of a blessed baby who was born one starry night in Bethlehem, and to be awful sorry for Patti."
I hope your holidays were wonderful and you have a great new year!
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... how many Ruth Kelleys are there?
(love your work, always makes me smile!)
Was there more than one?? I completely missed that.
I'm so glad you're enjoying the letters (and apparently paying closer attention to the names than I am).
(And I highly doubt you were expecting an actual answer but I'm a stats nerd when it comes to historical records so: as of the 1900 Census there were 179 Ruth Kelleys in the United States, if you include the Kelly spelling as well - there were 332.)
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