Is Cherry Garcia Kosher?

One young Hispanic man left a booth at Denver's 2008 Cinco de Mayo Festival exclaiming, "No way! I'm Jewish?" He evidently had not attended Michael Gonzales' presentation.

On one side of the booth were poster boards that displayed articles and images designed to educate spectators about the Spanish Inquisition and the violence poured out on the Sephardic Jews. On the other side of the booth was a list of 5,220 Sephardic Jewish surnames. The list contains most of the common Spanish surnames like Garcia, Rodriguez and Martinez. "However," explained Gonzales, "if your name is on the list it doesn't necessarily mean that you are Jewish. If your name is not on the list it doesn't mean you are not. Come to the presentation to find out more." [Link]

The Difference Between Brad Pitt and God

An Illinois artist wants to change his name to "In God We Trust."

Yes. First name, "In God." Last name, "We Trust."

School bus driver and amateur artist Steve Kreuscher of Zion will appear in a Lake County court June 13, hoping the judge will grant his request.

"I want this with all my heart," says the 57-year-old father of four.

Northbrook attorney Alan Pearlman, who has handled hundreds of name change cases, said he's not aware of any specific list of rules. But he said a judge can deny names that are racial slurs or considered obscene. If they violate trademarks, or duplicate the name of a celebrity, they would likely be rejected.

"I doubt a judge would let you change your name to Brad Pitt," he said. [Link]

[Thanks, Drew!]

A Family Full of Fischers

In one family, three generations of Fischers have married Fischers.

“It’s a common name,” explains George Fischer, “at least in Germany, it’s a common name.”

“And names run in our families,” adds Katie Fischer (née Fischer). “My mother’s name was Katherine, I’m Katherine and my niece is named Katherine. She’s the other Katherine Fischer who married a Fischer. Also, my father was Joe and so is our son.”

The couple's nephew and niece later married.

“It wasn’t easy convincing the priest,” recalls John Fischer. “Katherine and I had the same last name. George is my uncle and Katie is Katherine’s aunt. We were definitely related, but not by blood. It took some explaining.”

The third generation Fischer to marry a Fischer is Lydia Fischer (grand-daughter to George and Katie) who married Philip Fischer. “He was no relation,” Katie says. “They met when Philip came to the house to do some work.” [Link]

Why You Should Mind Your Ps and Qs

Jose Iuerdo's years in prison allowed him to move up in the world—or at least in the phone book.

In leaving prison the last time, he lost his birth name. What happened — and he swears this is true — he was imprisoned so long, the Department of Motor Vehicles "expunged" his name.

And his birth certificate was somewhere in Colorado. When he applied for a new identification card, someone interpreted the typed "Q" as an "I" and that's why he's now Iuerdo and not Querdo.

That's OK with him. He's happier with the new Jose than the old Jose. [Link]

Don't Call Him Mr. Moon

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has been in office 16 months, and people still can't get his name right.

Recently, the U.N.'s chief of staff, Vijay Nambiar, sent a letter of "concern" to U.N. employees worldwide, a copy of which was obtained by Newsmax.

In the letter dated March 31, 2008, Nambiar writes, "Dear Colleague, I address you in a matter of some delicacy. Ever since taking office, the Secretary-General has had to cope with the question of ensuring clarity and accuracy in the recognition of his name . . .

"This is not an unusual problem, but it remains a matter of some frustration, that despite the passage of a year and some months, there still remains some confusion on this score. Many world leaders, some of who are well acquainted with the Secretary-General, still use his first name mistakenly as his surname and address him wrongly as Mr. Ki-moon or Mr. Moon." [Link]

Province Just Says No

New Brunswick won't allow Sharon (Weed) Thorne to put her maiden name on a license plate.

Sharon Thorne has even brought officials a copy of her birth certificate, but they still refuse to allow her to attach a tag that says "WEED" to her beloved 2001 Mustang convertible.

"I am not promoting drug use," she complained this week. "I do not smoke marijuana, have never inhaled it even once, don't sell it, am adamantly against it and have no criminal record.

"I have always been proud my name was unique, and thought people would see the plate and realize they went to school with me, or knew my parents or something. It was meant to be a fun thing, but has turned into something really annoying." [Link]

Christ Will Be There

J. Christ will be attending the Mass held by Pope Benedict at Yankee Stadium today.

A "regular Catholic," [John] Christ, a former sanitation director for the Fashion Center Business Improvement District, was born 62 years ago to an Italian mother and Greek father who Americanized his name from Christopoulos. He pronounces his surname "Chris."

Through school, his name was never an issue - until he enlisted in the Army in 1966. "They teased me," he recalled. "They asked me if I walked on water and made me do more pushups and run a little longer than the other guys." [Link]

He Ain't Heavy, He's My Dead Husband

Language Log today has an interesting post on the language of the Carrier people of British Columbia. With the arrival of a Francophone priest in 1865, and the subsequent influence of English speakers, their names changed.

There are a few family names of Carrier origin. There are a great many people named “Ketlo”, which is the anglicization of /ketloh/ (English speakers can’t hear the final /h/), which is the contracted form of /ke dʌtloh/ “squishy shoes”. The progenitor of the family was called by this nickname because he was always getting his feet wet.

As I mentioned, the idea of having both a given name and a family name was an innovation of the late 19th century, and to Carrier people it wasn’t terribly clear which was which or how they were passed on. As a result, some children would take their father’s first name as their family name and some the second. The little village of K’uzche, for example, is populated mostly by people named either “William” or “Austin”. They are actually the same family: the patriarch was named “William Austin”.

Wikipedia offers this account of how the Dakelh came to be called "Carriers":

According to noted anthropologist Antonia Mills, the term "Carrier" was derived from the mortuary tradition of carrying the husband's ashes back to the main traditional village site, where a potlatch would be held acknowledging the passing of the individual and dealing with redistributing his property. Which would make sense when considering seasonal movements and the need to bring the ashes back to the village as proof.

A Wife by Any Other Name...

Shakespeare was married to both Ann Hathaway and Agnes Gardner of Shottery. At the same time!

The only evidence that Richard Hathaway alias Gardner of Shottery had a daughter called Ann is a reference in his will to a daughter called Agnes. Scholars have demonstrated convincingly that in this period Agnes and Ann were simply treated as versions of the same name, pointing out dozens of examples where Agnes, pronounced 'Annis', gradually becomes 'Ann'. Richard Hathaway left a sheep to a great-niece he calls Agnes, though according to the parish record she was actually christened Annys; in 1600 she was buried as Ann. Theatre manager Philip Henslowe called his wife Agnes in his will but she was buried as Ann. Ann's brother Bartholomew called a daughter Annys, but she was buried as Ann. The curate William Gilbert alias Higgs who wrote Hathaway's will married Agnes Lyncian, but she was buried as Ann Gilbert. This is not simply serendipitous. Agnes was the name of a fourth-century virgin martyr of the kind whose lurid and preposterous adventures are the stuff of The Golden Legend, justly ridiculed by protestant reformers. Ann (or Hannah) was the solid biblical name of the Redeemer's grandmother. It is only to be expected that as protestantism gained hearts and minds Agnes would be silently driven out by Ann. We may accept that the child born Agnes Hathaway grew up to be Ann Shakespeare. [Link]

Think Before You Name a Child 'Iona'

And the winner of the Worst Bad Name Contest is ... Iona Knipl.

The judges chose it because, in addition to being an embarrassing pun, it also set up an inevitable reply from people imagining they were being wittily original. I called up Miss Knipl and asked her how many times she had heard someone meet her and reply, “I own two.”

“I got sick of hearing it, but what can you do?” Miss Knipl said. “My mother never thought about that when she was naming me. It was her mother’s name. I came home from school a couple times crying and my mother said, ‘Oh, why did I do that?’ but it had never occurred to her how people would hear the name.”

She Saw Nothing Wrong With Tobacco Juice

Brian Tingley's entry in TierneyLab's Best Weird-Name Story Contest:

The Gazette was a bi-weekly publication of the Government of the Province of Saskatchewan in Canada. It contained the official notification of new legislation pending, laws passed, hearings scheduled, and so on. What made it most interesting was the list of proposed name changes. If you planned to change your name, the old and new names had to be published in the Gazette.

So there it was that I saw Thelma Jean Tobacco Juice had applied to change her name. The poor woman. How she must have been the subject of ridicule through her growing up years. But she seemed to have missed the point. Her new name… Mary Elizabeth Tobacco Juice.

I Suppose It's Better Than 'Butter'

Nancy Bovy spotted this little girl in the Missouri Death Certificates.

A little research turns up an Oleomargarine Fristoe, born in 1922, who married in Jackson County, Missouri, in 1965.

Why did Missourians around 1920 name kids after fake butter? Maybe because oleomargarine was for many years an illicit substance, but started to gain wide popular acceptance during and after World War I. Missouri seems to have been the first state to ban margarine, in 1881. A later statute prohibited the manufacture or sale of any substance "in imitation or semblance of natural butter," or which "resemble[d] yellow or any shade of genuine yellow butter." Other states went so far as to require that margarine be colored bright pink, so that consumers would not mistakenly think it was edible. My mother, born in 1944, remembers adding yellow coloring to white margarine when she was a girl. Only after Congress passed the Margarine Act of 1950 were companies allowed to sell the yellow sticks of oleo we know and love today.

SSINF (So Stupid It's Not Funny)

The Daily Mail reports that the popularity of text messaging is influencing the naming of children.

Anne has been changed to An, Connor to Conna and Laura to Lora.

There were reportedly six boys who were named Cam'ron instead of Cameron, and according to the online parenting club Bounty, one girl born last month was born Flicity.

John Dunford, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said that it was possible that new mothers and fathers had lost the ability to spell forenames.

He added: "Some of it is genuine misspelling; some is parents looking for a unique way to spell a name and some is just carelessness." [Link]

[Thanks, Nancy!]

Sean From the Shtetl

Schelly at Tracing the Tribe writes today about the old "They changed our name at Ellis Island" myth. The linked article tells the apocryphal story of a Jewish immigrant who ending up with the name "Sean Fergusson."

“It’s like this,” the second Jew said. “My name was Moshke Rabinowitz. The first time I arrived at Ellis Island, I failed the eye test, so the doctors sent me back to Europe. There my eyes were treated and cured, and I decided to try again. But what would happen, I thought, if I turned up a second time as the same Moshke Rabinowitz? They’d already know me and send me back again. And so I decided to call myself Yankl Katzenstein. Still, what if someone recognized me? And so there I was, standing in line at Ellis Island and getting more and more nervous all the time, and when it’s finally my turn I’m so flustered that I can’t remember my new name. The immigration official asks me what it is, and I can’t think of it; it’s simply escaped me. ‘Oy, kh’hob shoyn fargesn!’ I say. ‘Sean Fergusson?’ the official repeats, and writes it down on the form.”

In Yiddish, of course, kh’hob shoyn fargesn means “I’ve forgotten.” [Link]

Have a Hugh Jass in Your Family?

The authors of the new book Bad Baby Names relied mostly on U.S. census records.

• Long before Bart Simpson made prank calls to Moe's Tavern, children were burdened with names such as "Mike Rotch," "Hugh Jass," "Ivana Tinkle" and "Maya Buttreeks."
• Think the "Boy named Sue" had to be tough? How about Cinderella Liverotti, whom the authors note was "sadly, a man, and a coal miner at that."
• Babies named after food include "Lettuce Crum," "Hoagie Hoagland," "Onion Critzer," "Mustard M. Mustard" and "Tomato Billips."
• Among the simply comical Dickensian monikers are "Leech Goodpaster," "Smock Bufner," "Knob Simmons," "Hose Belt," "Glove Butts" and "Hornby Toot." [Link]

The Name Remains the Same

Edward Krumreig XVIII of Cape Coral, Florida, died last week—two months before his great-grandson and namesake is due.

If Edward the 18th could have lived until mid-April, the family patriarch would have joined Edward the 19th, Edward the 20th and Edward the 21st.

It would have been the first time in the 525-year family history four men named Edward Ludwig Krumreig were alive. [Link]

Apostrophes Lead to Catastrophes

Irish Voice editor Niall O'Dowd resorted to "giving up his national identity" to book a flight to Atlanta. As often happens, the computer just wouldn't accept an apostrophe.

"I dropped the apostrophe and ran my name as 'ODowd,"' he said.

The Irish apostrophe began with the British, who put it there because they believed the O looked odd without a link to the rest of the name. Many native Gaelic speakers in Ireland refuse to carry an apostrophe, considering it a vestige of colonial days.

"Maybe that's the solution," said O'Dowd, who just last week was rejected by an online alarm clock service. "Maybe we should just drop the apostrophe altogether, not just as a nationalist statement but because I'd like my alarm call to work in the morning." [Link]

[Thanks, Nancy!]

An 'ee' for an 'eye'

Pulaski County, Indiana, is named for Revolutionary War General Kazimierz Pułaski, but its name is pronounced differently: with an "eye" at the end instead of an "ee."

But La Porte's Casmir Pulaski, a descendant of General Pulaski, wants things to change. He says it all starts with the parents.

"It has to start with them teaching their children how to say it," said Pulaski. "And they will grow up saying Pulaski. It's going to take about a generation, maybe two, but eventually it will be pronounced correctly." [Link]

Is That a GEDCOM in Your Pocket?

What do I have in common with Dave, Paul, Steve, James, Mark, Robert, Andy, Dick and Dan? We all write about genealogy. And, um, something else...

MLK and His Grandfather Abe Lincoln

Martin Luther King, Jr., is a graphics designer and children's book author who lives in the suburbs of Atlanta. He goes by "Marty."

Marty King, 53, was named for his father, who was named for the German monk and theologian Martin Luther, founder of the Protestant Reformation in the early 1500s.

It's not the only famous name in his family. Marty King's grandfather was named Abraham Lincoln.

The name connection has caused some hassles along the way. There was the time the U.S. Postal Service canceled his mail and marked it "deceased." [Link]