Ormond

The "Living" section of the Omaha World-Herald has a new editor. He forgot to put my column in the paper yesterday so it's in there today instead. Two weeks from now it should be back on Tuesdays. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-the-names-teresa-and-theresa-get-a-boost-from/article_2726a0bf-6350-5d42-8468-76693bfd822a.html

Here is the link to today's column. Evidently Ralph Waldo Emerson's family thought they must be descended from Peter Waldo. They can't be directly descended from him, because he only had daughters, and there is no evidence that they are descended from Waldensian immigrants to England. The farthest back the family has been traced so far is to Thomas Waldo, who lived in the town of Mitcham in Surrey, England in the late 1500s. There is a street called Waldo Place in Mitcham today. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-you-can-find-waldo-if-you-look-hard-enough/article_481877ee-8f1f-506d-9af3-8d3831516567.html

There isn't any way to specifically search just my columns on the World Herald site. You can try searching for "Cleveland Evans" along with the specific name, but I think even their archives only give you access to the past two years.

Here's today's column. There is an Italian name Gavino which has no etymological connection with Gavin, but some Italian-Americans may have used Gavin as an Anglicization of that name. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-roots-of-gavin-go-back-to-knights-of-the/article_9d05fef7-2317-5215-bb75-bcd9da7278ef.html

Here's today's column. I had no idea until I researched this that Chaucer was the one who made Valentine's Day a day for lovers. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-chaucer-gave-love-nudge-to-st-valentine/article_55fb685a-9fdf-5839-8d71-0cf07a695fb9.html

Francis and Frances DO have the gender distinction in the USA.

I don't know -- you tell me! In Scotland, is one of these considered "masculine" and the other "feminine"? There certainly isn't any distinction by spelling that way in the USA.

In Britain they normally think of "Vivian" as a male spelling and "Vivien" as a female one, but that distinction has never been made in the USA, where "Vivian" has always been the most common spelling for girls. This makes Vivian/Vivien similar to Leslie/Lesley: in England Leslie is considered masculine and Lesley feminine, but in the USA no such distinction is made.

Here's the link to today's column. Sorry I did not have room to mention Carroll O'Connor. Also, in case you are wondering, the word "carol" as in "Christmas carol" has nothing to do with the name -- though I suspect that occasionally babies born during the Christmas season have been named Carol because parents made that association. -- I saw Carol Channing myself in a performance of "Hello, Dolly!" about 20 years ago. She was still great in the role then even though she was in her 70s. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-once-popular-carol-has-royal-roots/article_bdd163c8-35ca-5996-83e6-c3612c8718ed.html

No one nominated Obama. "Hamilton" is a "fictional name" as the title of the musical, which is a fictional presentation even though based on historical events, just as historical novels are fiction even though based on real events.

I am the moderator of the meeting where ANS votes on the Names of the Year and so do not vote myself. The nominations that gave me the most "pause" were a few I didn't even mention in the newspaper column, which were obviously made by someone trying to promote a book they themselves had written or a product whose trade name they had created. We've never had "dissent" in terms of someone protesting a winner. We certainly have had discussion and some votes were closer than others. Aleppo won the final vote by 3 over Drumpf this year. The task of the voters is to vote for names which showed the impact of names and naming in and of itself the past year. In that sense I can see that Drumpf was a good choice as Personal Name of the Year. In saying that, though, I am not endorsing John Oliver's use of it, because it makes me a little queasy. Donald Trump didn't choose to change the name himself, and what does using Drumpf to make fun of Trump say to anyone who is still named Drumpf in Germany or the US? Is it really better to make fun of someone's ancestral name than to make fun of other things about their ancestors they cannot control, like their race or occupations? This seems a bit like people in another thread on this board using the "wrong" pronouns for a particular transgender person who may not deserve "respect", without realizing that hurts all transgender persons. I worry that the mocking of "Drumpf" has the potential to hurt many people with "funny surnames" who do not deserve it.

Here is today's column, the annual one about The American Name Society's Names of the Year vote. I suppose that if Drumpf had won the overall title instead of just Personal Name of the Year that there was a slight chance we might have gotten a tweet from a certain soon-to-be-President about it. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-bittersweet-distinction-for-once-proud-name-aleppo/article_8a002469-3c11-54c9-bc21-27d9f2553e4c.html

Here's the link to today's column: http://www.omaha.com/living/cleveland-evans-genevieve-again-revving-for-favor/article_d6cc741a-61f5-5bfe-992e-9f66cd4487f7.html An apology to those who know French: I had the proper accent mark in what I wrote when I was referring to specifically French or French Canadian women, but the editing somehow left that out.

Sorry, there's never enough room to mention every moderately famous person who has a particular name.

Here's the link to today's column. It seems that with Jamie, Agnes, and Callum I have coincidentally been writing a lot about names with Scottish connections lately. It's nice to have the photo from the film, but technically I think in that scene Fassbender is playing Callum Lynch's ancestor Aguilar, not Callum himself. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-assassin-s-creed-movie-may-help-the-name-callum/article_87d1f472-2054-52fa-8904-9b157188d4c2.html

Oh, yes, and I know there are women in Scotland whose name on their birth certificate is Senga. Though there may be a Gaelic origin for Senga, many think its use in modern Scotland owes a lot to its being a backspelling of Agnes.

Here's today's column. Sorry I didn't have space to explain another part of Agnes's medieval popularity was its association with the Latin word "agnus" or "lamb" and the important place of that in Christian iconography. Also that I think the Gossip Girl character may have been inspired by the model turned actress Agnes Bruckner -- born in California in 1985, her parents were immigrants from Hungary and Russia and so may not have realized what an "ugly elderly" image Agnes had for Americans back then. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-headstrong-martyr-propelled-agnes/article_dc9c0e74-78ef-59e5-be5c-3ca4c27e6ab1.html

Here's today's column. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-masculine-jamie-caught-on-for-girls/article_8e7ff957-2c41-52ab-abc4-cb4a30d5fdf1.html

Here's today's column. The information on Donald is 95% cut and pasted from the column I wrote on that name 5 years ago when it happened to fall on Trump's birthday! Sorry I didn't have room to mention Hilary Swank or other famous Hilarys born during the name's US heyday in the 1980s. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-regardless-of-who-wins-don-t-expect-a-lot/article_3b03b3b8-03b5-5d61-9346-7f40009c1b59.html

well, you have to remember that census takers back in the 19th century were NOT chosen because they had good penmanship or because they were good spellers -- it was a political patronage job. Also, you can't rely on the index alone but should check the original record. Certainly sometimes names change from one census to another because the person involved had changed in the form of their name they preferred to be called by. But simple mistakes by census takers are probably just as common.

Here's today's column. As with any extremely common traditional name, there was a lot more I could have said I didn't have space for. Sorry, Robert Frost and Robert Baratheon. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-from-royal-roberts-to-baby-boomer-bobs/article_db7c14a9-3b93-5cbd-8e43-c702a2ff8422.html

Here's today's column. I will admit to really liking this name myself: http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-from-a-medieval-queen-to-a-first-lady-eleanors/article_b58fb5ad-5243-5438-9319-fc6208095604.html

Here's today's column. There were of course many other Samuels and Sams I could have mentioned if there had been room. In regard to the ASOIAF Sam, I discovered in my research for this column that "Samwell" is a rare English surname which does indicate an ancestor named Samuel. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-raise-a-pint-to-sam-his-historical-ties/article_94ace598-2727-535b-9a66-e4aef876f9f8.html

Sorry I've been so busy I couldn't post this before today. As an American I've always felt a bit confused by the existence of Bridget Cromwell ever since I learned about her -- wondering how on earth Oliver Cromwell came to give his daughter a name I've always thought of as the quintessential Irish Catholic name. I was fascinated to learn that, like Patrick, the Irish actually considered Bridget "too sacred" to give real girls back then, and it only became popular with them, ironically, when their English rulers forbade other Gaelic names. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-from-ancient-irish-roots-to-ren-e-zellweger-s/article_1e612d66-358a-5702-9587-a90d7588179e.html

Here's the link to my latest column. I tried to post this a few days ago and for some reason the copy function wouldn't work. http://www.omaha.com/living/evans-cameron-journeys-from-the-highlands-to-hollywood/article_ee3ecb4a-d0fb-5ed2-beb4-9c2d85748d75.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=user-share