In my top secret Baby Name Cave, I've been crunching numbers, calculating formulas, and mixing potions. At last, I emerge with the revelation all of America has been waiting for, the top baby names of the 2000s decade! And the names were...umm...Emily and Jacob, the names that ranked #1 year after year after year. Obviously.

With Jacob in particular on a decade-long run, how could it be otherwise? Yet I felt compelled to bang the gong on this subject after reading a series of news reports with names like Aiden, Emma and Madeline crowned champions of the decade.

As usual, the problem is that reporters take a company's press release about the top names of its customers at face value. In one particularly egregious example, Reuters ran a whole story reporting name stats based on a press release of a personalized gift company. If you read the company's release carefully, they never even claimed the stats were about BABY names -- just the names that their customers chose to be printed on custom CDs.

So here are the facts. Even without knowing the 2009 numbers, I can report authoritatively that Jacob and Emily were the top names of the decade. They would win the honor easily, even if zero Jacobs and Emilys were born in 2009. What's more, Emma -- the top name of 2008 -- isn't even #2 for the decade.

The key to understanding the decade-long stats is that the top of the curve has continued to drop as parents try to avoid popular names.



What Emma won in 2008 was a war of attrition. The number of Emmas born that year was down significantly from the name's peak, and would only have been enough to rank the name #4 back in 2000. Meanwhile Madison never reached the #1 spot, but hung around at #2-3 long enough in the earlier "fat" years to earn the second overall spot for the decade. Michael has been the steady #2 for boys.

It's too early to predict the name champions of the 2010s, but one forecast looks solid: whatever they are, they'll be less popular than Jacob and Emily were this decade, and an afterthought compared to the once-upon-a-time heights of John and Mary.

p.s. I'm still looking for name-locked parents to participate in a video project, pass it on!

I’m working on a video project and need the help of a couple that can’t agree on a name! If you...

- Live in either the greater Boston or Philadelphia area

- Expect a child sometime between February and early April

- Are willing to allow a me (and a camera) into your home to film you as you discuss your naming dilemma

...please get in touch with me via the site contact form. Use "video project" as the subject line, and please include this background info in the message:

- Your email address

- Your names, ages, and due date

- Your existing children’s names and ages, if applicable

- Your city and state

- A summary of your naming disagreements

I'd love to hear from you as soon as possible; the deadline for consideration is January 15, 2010. And feel free to pass this request along to other expectant parents!

Thanks,

Laura

"Meet my son, Thornton." It doesn't get more buttoned-down that that, does it? Thornton is old school, a dense WASPy surname linked with 19th-century-born writers Thornton Wilder and Thornton Burgess. Packing five heavy consonant sounds, Thornton doesn't sound particularly contemporary, let alone exciting.

But what about Thorn? There's a modern name with an edge, a soap opera favorite ready to scale cliffs or plot ruthless revenge.

With most names, a nickname just softens the full name or helps it loosen up and have fun. With a name like Thornton, it does more. It gives you two complete and distinct identities, like Clark Kent and Superman. The mild mannered shell peels back to reveal a dashing alter ego.

Not every name with a super-charged nickname can fit the bill. You can't get the same effect by, say, extending Thorn into Thornsyn or using it as a nickname for Thatcher. The long version (typically a surname) has to be traditional and familiar in its own right, and the nickname has to emerge from it with an ease approaching inevitability. And just as in the world of superheros, male examples dominate.

Here's my starter list of Clark Kent names. Can you think of more?

Bosworth/Boss
Forsyth/Force
Foxworth/Fox
Hawkins/Hawk
Kingsley/King
Marsden/Mars
Ripley/Rip
Starling/Star
Swanson/Swan
Thornton/Thorn
Wolford/Wolf

We've counted down the first and second runners up, and now it's time for the official 2009 Name of the Year. Brace yourselves, name enthusiasts, because it may not be what you're expecting....

Renesmee.

Yes, it's another Twilight name, which makes for a potent and timely launching pad. But the impact of Renesmee goes far beyond vampires. This name is the spark that lit a long-building cultural bonfire to usher in the Age of the Mashup Baby Name.

For those who have skipped the whole Twilight phenomenon, Renesmee is the child of the series' two young heroes, and thus half human and half vampire. Most importantly for our purposes she is named after her two grandmothers, Renée and Esme. (Her middle name, Carlie, comes from grandpas Carlisle and Charlie.)

Twilight author Stephenie Meyer has said that she chose the name because no normal human name would do for an otherworldly creature like Renesmee. It also strikes me as a realistic choice for a couple of teenage parents. Undead or not, they live in a time when creativity in baby name is prized, particularly by younger parents. What's more, they live in a celebrity-saturated world, in the long shadow of Bennifer.

When actors Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez started dating in 2002, the press christened the pair Bennifer. Since then, a portmanteau or "mashup" name has been de rigueur for every celebrity couple, real or fictional. (See yesterday's discussion of Tay Tay.) A young adult today has come of age surrounded by names like TomKat and Brangelina.

Renesmee, introduced at the end of 2008, brought a new name to our language. Real-life Renesmee sightings are increasing all the time. More importantly, though, it broke down the barriers between celebrity mashups and baby names. As a BabyNameWizard.com reader wrote, "I do know of several people that copied the idea and gave their children first or middle names that are mash-ups of the grandparents' names."

In Namipedia, I've seen a rising number of name submissions created from two parents' or grandparents' names. (I usually reject them, assuming that a name like Brendeth will only appeal to the narrow group of readers who also have parents named Brenda and Kenneth.) Our sister blog "Ask The Name Lady," too, is receiving more and more questions about how to combine family names like George and Edward.

Like all celebrity name trends, Renesmee's fashion power depends on the fact that the world was ready for it. To quote The Name Lady's column, "For centuries, the way to honor Grandpa George and Grandpa Edward was obvious. George Edward. Or Edward George, if you prefer. That's what a namesake is, right?" Renesmee became the name of the moment, and the Name of the Year, because parents today still love their relatives...but aren't willing to sacrifice their sense of style to show it.

With best wishes for the naming year to come,

Laura

Yesterday I started the countdown to the Name of the Year with the second runner up. Today we continue....

First runner up: Taylor

Whether you listen to the radio, read gossip magazines or just follow the world on Twitter, I suspect you'll agree: this was Taylor Swift's year. The young singer/songwriter was everywhere. From a name perspective, though, her real breakthrough came in the romance department. As rumors flew that Swift was dating "Twilight" star Taylor Lautner, a delighted fan and media corps labeled the pair "Tay Tay."

Consider Tay Tay the official clarion call that the androgynous surname generation has come of age. Taylor Swift was born in 1989, the very year that the name Taylor first cracked the top 100 for girls. Jordan broke through that same year, then Madison, Bailey and Mackenzie a few years later, then...well, you get the picture. Meanwhile Taylor held on as a male name. When Taylor Lautner was born in 1992 his name was a solid hit, ranking #52 for boys.

Up until now, these names sounded like kids. If you heard about a Taylor or Madison or Mackenzie, you could assume they were still playground-aged. But this is one case where gossip columns don't lie. From here on out, when you come across one of these names you shouldn't assume anything, including their sex. As one nominator wrote about the Taylors, "I think it is noteworthy that both can carry the name equally well. Nobody has criticized Lautner's masculinity or Swift's femininity because they happen to share a name with their significant other. To me, that seems very current."

On to the official Name of the Year!

You can paint a portrait of a year in names. That truth came through loud and clear in the hundreds of thoughtful reader nominations for the Baby Name Wizard Name of the Year. From Bernie and Neda to Jackson and Octomom, you all made compelling cases for the names that shaped, and were shaped by, 2009.

To do the names justice, I'm splitting this year's announcement into three parts. The two runners up and the Name of the Year made the grade through their timeliness, resonance, and "naminess" -- how essential the name itself was to the cultural story. And as always, I was guided by reader nominations, seconds and comments. Thanks, everybody.

Second runner up: Falcon

On October 15, 2009, officials in Colorado scrambled to respond to a bizarre emergency. A Fort Collins family had accidentally released a homemade weather balloon, and their six-year-old son Falcon was believed to be inside. After frantic hours in which National Guard helicopters tracked the balloon and the Denver International Airport was shut down, young Falcon Heene was found safe at home. Eventually, the entire episode was revealed to be a hoax. Falcon's parents had met in acting school, had appeared on a reality tv series, and were eagerly shopping their own reality tv concept without success. They dreamed up the balloon stunt in hopes that the publicity would help get their family back on the air.

This story brought together two powerful trends, highlighting an underlying theme they have in common. 2009 was the year that, in the words of one BabyNameWizard.com reader, "exploded the myth of reality TV." As reality shows pushed the limits of celebrity-seeking and self-revelation, viewers began to squirm.  In particular, stories like the "balloon boy" and the divorce of Jon and Kate Gosselin raised questions about putting children's lives in front of the camera.

Meanwhile, American parents were working harder and harder to choose eye-catching names to make their children stand out. The traditional classics were plummeting in popularity, while names like Cannon, Messiah and Phoenix were soaring. Surely it's no coincidence that parents so desperate for attention that they'd coach their six-year-old to carry out a media hoax were also parents who chose to name him Falcon? As another reader wrote, "We have such an obsession with fame and the actions of one family have us thinking about at what cost."

On to part 2!

I have a file where I jot down little name questions, curiosities and mysteries for future investigation. Some of those questions eventually grow into full-fledged columns. Others just languish on the list, sadly neglected.

Here are two of the orphans. Care to play name detective and help me solve them?

Ansley in Georgia. Ansley is an uncommon girl's name, currently ranking #719 in America. It wouldn't make the national charts at all, though, if it weren't for Georgia, where Ansley has been a top-hundred name every year since 1994. Why? Yes, there is an Ansley, GA with a golf course, but there are plenty of attractively named towns and golf courses in Georgia that don't get the baby name treatment.

The Stephanie Rebound. In some ways, baby names seem to obey the same laws as the physical world. For instance, one of the hardest things in the name world is to reverse momentum. Once a popular name starts to decline, the sense that it's getting stale grows and it keeps on falling. In the rare case that you spot a name reversing its decline, you can draw the same conclusion you could with a ball that turns around and rolls uphill: it was acted upon by an outside force.

Stephanie was such a name in the 1970s, declining for three years than surging back bigger than ever. The question is, what was the outside force?