Tuesday, May 3, 2011

What's in a name?

I think it's really cool when people are named after someone. I wasn't named after anyone in particular, my parents just liked the name. My brother, Eric, was named after Eric Clapton though because he was my dad's favorite guitarist.
Did you know Garth was named after someone? No, it was not Garth Brooks. The poor guy didn't even know who Garth Brooks was when he moved to the U.S. Garth was named after his mom's favorite cricket player, Garth Le Roux.
Pretty cool, huh? It's pretty funny because he kinda looks like Garth. So...were you named after anyone?

***Interestingly, my dad wrote me an email after reading this post and I wanted to share how my parents were named...
"It reminded me that we've probably never told you that Mom & I were each named after someone (or something in Mom's case... that sounds funny!).

My parents told me they got the name Daryl from the famous movie producer Darryl Zanuck. So, I'm not named after him. They just liked the name. I remember him. He was very famous in Hollywood for a long time; and then his son Richard Zanuck was famous. His family is still in the movie business. Mom and I watched a movie this week ("Get Low" starring Robert Duvall) that was produced by Harrison & Dean Zanuck. They are Darryl's grandsons. Here's a link to a Wikipedia article about Darryl:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darryl_F._Zanuck

I recall hearing that Mom's parents got the name Dianne from a hurricane! No wonder she is so weather-obsessed! There was a Hurricane Diane in 1955, so that fits the timing (Mom was born in '56). Here's a link to a Wikipedia article on Hurricane Diane. It says that "Diane was the costliest hurricane in United States history" up to that time. So I'm sure it was in the news quite a bit just before Grandma got pregnant with Mom.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Diane

It's funny that my parents dropped an "r" from Darryl and Mom's parents added an "n" to Diane. Makes us unique, I guess."

11 comments:

Natalie said...

I was named after actress Natalie Wood!

Lauren said...

I wanna say I think my mom named me after the actress Lauren Becall. Not 100% positive, I’ll have to ask her but thinking I’m right, ha! Also, interesting fact, someone was named after me. When I was really young I had a neighbor friend that I was really close with and tragically he and his mother were in a car accident and he ended up passing away. His mom and dad didn’t think they’d be able to have any more kids but they did and they had a little girl, and they named her after me. Still see “Lauren” around town.

Bekah said...

my moms cousin, not that they were exceptionallt close, but my mom and dad just really liked the name!

Sassy Amie said...

I was named after a great-great grandmother.. Except she had 2 m's in her name. I'm glad because I really like the spelling!

Gwen said...

How fun! I was named after a character in some book my Mom was reading when she had me. LOL!

LWLH said...

I was named after my great grandmother! :)

Anonymous said...

I got my middle name after my great grandma.

Hnou Gonzalez said...

Oh, I love this post!

My name means "the sun" in my native tongue and my grandma loved it so that's what I got.

We picked our daughter's name Amelia initially just because we liked it, then come to find out, it is actually her great, great grandma's name.

The Shabby Princess said...

I'm named after a "thing" and my middle name is after my cousin. It was the only name my parents could agree on! (the "thing" I was named after is a type of engine/transmission)

Perfectly Imperfect said...

I was named after some popular at the time soap star. BG is named after one of hubs' favorite singers that also represents a decade I'm obsessed with. Her middle name is biblical. I love names with meaning!

Debbie said...

My first name Deborah is a biblical name and my middle name Mary after my beloved Grandmother.