Golden Girl Names

Golden Girl Names

When The Golden Girls hit the small screen in 1985, the names of its leading ladies—Rose, Dorothy and Blanche—were late middle aged, and Mama Sophia was old enough to have already been in and out of  the Shady Pines Nursing Home.  That was 25 years ago, a period of major change in the name world.  Sophia is now the seventh most popular baby name (and #1 in some places), Rose is America‘s favorite middle name, and Dorothy is one of the belles of the nameberry name boards.

Not only that: other Golden Girl names, names that were virtually written off just a couple of years ago, are back in play.  Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick, for example, named one of their twin daughters Marion, Julia Roberts chose Hazel for hers and Molly Ringwald picked Adele.  And nameberryites are cool with similar period names like Clara and Cora, Vivian and Vera.

Here are some other alternative names that might have been used for the Golden Girls ladies—are any of them ready to join Rose and Sophia?

ALMA

BETTY

CEIL

DELLA

DORIS

EDITH

EDNA

ELEANOR

ESTHER

ETHEL

EVELYN

FAY

FLORENCE

GLADYS

HELEN

IRENE

JEAN

JOY

JOYCE

LOIS

LUCILLE

MARIE

MARJORIE

MIRIAM

MONA

MURIEL

MYRNA

MYRA

NAOMI

NORMA

PAULINE

PEARL

PHYLLIS

ROSEMARY

RUTH

SALLY

SELMA

SIBYL

SHIRLEY

SYLVIA

TERESA

THELMA

And what if they were scripting and casting an updated 2010 version of the Girls?  Here are some plausible names for the new 65-year-old characters—are any of them ready for their baby-name comebacks or, in the words of another old sitcom, are they too close for comfort?

ANITA

ARLENE

BARBARA

BEVERLY

BONNIE

BRENDA

CAROL

CHERYL

DIANE

DOLORES

DONNA

EILEEN

ELAINE

ELLEN

GAIL

HELENE

JANET

JANICE

JOAN

JOANNE

JULIE

KAREN

KATHLEEN

LINDA

LORRAINE

LYNN

MARCIA/MARSHA

MARILYN

MARLENE

NANCY

PATRICIA

PAULA

ROBERTA

SANDRA

SHARON

SHEILA

SUSAN, SUZANNE

YVONNE

About the Author

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz is the co-founder of Nameberry, and co-author with Pamela Redmond of the ten baby naming books acknowledged to have revolutionized American baby naming. You can follow her personally at InstagramTwitter and Facebook. She is also the author of the highly acclaimed New York Review Books Classics novel Talk and a number of other books.