Weird names aren’t just a modern affliction: My first name is Huntington, and I’m the third generation to bear the thing. My great-grandfather (whose own Pa named him Dallas) had four boys: Dallas Jr. (!), Waitstill-upon-the-Lord, Morrison, and Huntington (the 1st). Where great-grandmother Grace was during all this we’re not sure – perhaps in a laudanum haze.
My maternal grandmother’s family’s names appear to have been normal, but she did laugh when recounting that she’d gone to school here in the Bay Area with a daughter of recent immigrants named Alameda Blessing.
Oh, and you’re so right about the perils of using nouns; verbs are an equal hazard. Mom’s Carol, which was fine until she married a man with the last name Sharp. Yep, at Christmas she sings just a little above the pitch. Since I’m Huntington the Third, I go by a nickname of my middle name, William. Uh-huh…I should work in accounts receivable. And lastly, Dad (Huntington the Second) shortens to Hunt, and is great to have around when something’s lost…
Sigh.
-Huntington (“Bill”) Sharp
I knew I had an cousin named Zollie Herbert Cowart, but I was unaware that it was a serial family name until I asked his son Mark what his whole name was and he said “Zollie Herbert Cowart III.” I was bamboozled, not only by the fact that they thought that name was awesome enough to pass on to 3 generations (at least), but how they got “Mark” out of that. Easy – it was because he had THREE MARKS AFTER HIS NAME. *sigh* I heard LOTS of interesting names growing up in rural MS in the 70’s.
(I myself was gifted with a doozie – Samantha Louanne Lovelace, thus the reason for just going by ‘Sam’ my whole life.