Baby names of 1898

Mary and John topped the lists in 1898, out of 381,454 births recorded across 2,987 different names. That is 9.9% more than the 1897 files hold.

← 1897 All years 1899 →

Girls

#	Name	Births
1	Mary	14,406
2	Anna	5,773
3	Helen	5,230
4	Margaret	4,696
5	Ruth	4,249
6	Florence	3,790
7	Elizabeth	3,659
8	Ethel	3,531
9	Marie	3,435
10	Lillian	3,061
11	Alice	2,846
12	Edna	2,813
13	Emma	2,788
14	Clara	2,731
15	Grace	2,726
16	Bessie	2,647
17	Bertha	2,642
18	Annie	2,470
19	Hazel	2,439
20	Rose	2,436
21	Minnie	2,409
22	Frances	2,379
23	Mabel	2,331
24	Gertrude	2,302
25	Martha	2,184

All 200 girls’ names of 1898 (1,975 recorded)

Boys

#	Name	Births
1	John	8,159
2	William	7,400
3	James	5,321
4	George	4,853
5	Charles	3,557
6	Joseph	3,171
7	Robert	2,932
8	Frank	2,925
9	Edward	2,337
10	Thomas	2,161
11	Henry	2,145
12	Harry	2,129
13	Walter	2,002
14	Arthur	1,619
15	Fred	1,447
16	Albert	1,417
17	Clarence	1,326
18	Willie	1,134
19	Dewey	1,115
20	Roy	1,049
21	Paul	991
22	Harold	963
23	Raymond	929
24	Carl	919
25	Earl	883

All 200 boys’ names of 1898 (1,289 recorded)

Biggest climbers, girls

Names that gained the most ground on 1897:

Manila #1,263 → #305 +958
Ouida #1,555 → #666 +889
Ula #1,555 → #697 +858
Sofia #1,555 → #719 +836
Leonor #1,555 → #840 +715
Dola #1,555 → #886 +669
Earline #1,385 → #719 +666
Claudine #1,263 → #619 +644

Biggest climbers, boys

Names that gained the most ground on 1897:

Fitzhugh #942 → #364 +578
Carson #1,057 → #523 +534
Enos #942 → #452 +490
Annie #1,057 → #573 +484
Worth #1,057 → #573 +484
Wheeler #1,057 → #573 +484
Ernst #1,057 → #573 +484
Lillie #1,057 → #635 +422

Annie and Lillie are here because the boys’ file records them: the SSA publishes every name given to five or more babies of one sex, and a rank is a position within that list. It is not a claim about whose name it is.

First recorded in 1898, girls

Names the SSA had never published before 1898:

Dewie and Lennis are here because the girls’ file records them: the SSA publishes every name given to five or more babies of one sex, and a rank is a position within that list. It is not a claim about whose name it is.

First recorded in 1898, boys

Names the SSA had never published before 1898:

Hobson 38
Admiral 25
Shafter 14
Maceo 13
Schley 10
Ewart 9
Arba 8
Von 7
Gladstone 7
Mickey 7

Try it on yourself

Source: US Social Security Administration national baby-name files. Names given to fewer than five babies in a year are not published, so the totals here run below the true number of births. How far below is not the same in every year: the files hold 201,484 births for 1880 and 3,315,343 for 2025, so a change from one year to the next in the early decades is partly a change in what the record covers.