What were your peers called?

[Justinripley]

Following on from another thread where a poster is the same age as myself but didn’t know anyone called Phoebe (yet I know of loads my age)

I thought it would be interesting to see what the most popular names in your year groups/friends were, depending on peoples locations.

So for example: I was born in the mid 90’s, South London and I grew up with loads of:

Sophia
Grace
Phoebe
Molly
Lily

Jack
Tom
Joe
Sam
Max

London burbs, late 80s.
Girls- Catherine/Katherine, Rachel, Sarah, Emma, Emily, Louise, Lucy
Boys- Matt, Chris, Nick, Alex, Tom, Mike

Popular middle name for girls in the 70s - Louise or Jane.

50s, northern England. Catherine, Alison, Anne-Marie, Gillian, Geraldine, Susan, Mary, Helen, Anne, Fiona, Linda, Karen

Late 70s in the SE.
Girls - Sarah, Claire, Lisa, Catherine/Katy or variations, Samantha, Nicola, Emma, Joanne.
Middle names almost exclusively Jane or Louise

Boys - 90 % of the boys I grew up with were either Mark, James or Chris. Daniel, Paul and Andrew also common.

Late 70s North of England

Girls: Claire, Emma, Catherine, Gemma, Jill

Boys: Michael, David, Steven, Paul, Andrew

I was born early 70s and literally every girl apart from me was called Sarah 🤣

Odd Emma or Louise for a bit of variety.

Boys were all Andrew or David or, at Push, Simon.

I think we've got much more diverse with names which I think is great and much better for multicultural societies that we now live in. My kids don't bat an eyelid at so called unusual or different names. You could introduce yourself as Carrot or Parsley and they wouldn't find it remarkable.

At primary early 70s, Essex:

Michelle
Lisa
Tracy
Sharon
Andrea
Brett
Jason
Gary
Paul
Darren

Midlands, born late 70s

Girls:

Claire
Sarah
Rebecca
Emma
Lisa
Kelly

Boys:

James
David
Peter
Ian
Steven
Thomas

I'm in my early 20s and my peer group are:

Girls: Katie, Liv, Megan, Georgia, Ellie, Lucy, Lizzie, Emily, Millie, Lily, Izzy

Often these names would be short for e.g. Olivia, Ellen, Elizabeth, Isabel, etc. with their full name never actually used.

Boys: Dan, Harry, Tom, Ben, Sam, Toby, Chris, James, Joe, Charlie

I'm noticing the pattern of names ending in an -ee sound and one-syllable boys names.

Born mid 50's Edinburgh state school.
Girls
Alexandra. Elaine. Karen. Eileen. Lorraine. Fiona. Linda. Freda. Doreen. Helen. Christine. Grace.
Boys
John. James. William. Peter. Duncan. George. Archive. Robert. Terry. Mungo. Martin. Sidney.

Mid 70,s South East

Nicola
Emma
Claire
Catherine
Louise
Danielle
Charlotte
Lindsey
Paula
Jackie
Jenny
Elizabeth

John
Paul
Stephen
Michael
Nicolas
Richard
Robert
James
David
Nathan
Andrew
Ben

I was very late 80s and this list of names is literally the school register 😅😅

Essex 70's in infant school my classmates names included

Amanda
Angela
Carol/e
Deborah
Joanne
Susan
Karen
Tracey
Mandy
Sally
Jackie
Julie
Beverley
Denise
Lorraine

Andrew
Alan
Stuart
Mark
Martin
Michael
Nigel
Paul
Ian
David
John
Clive
Simon
Stephen/Steven
Geoffrey
Colin
Sean/Shaun
Dean
Neil

Amelia w/ Millie as a NN could go on mine too.

As could Izzy short for Isobel/Isabelle.

Adding Rosa and Ella.

Born in the 50s.
My contemporaries were:
Jane, Karen, Susan, Margaret, Cordelia, Julia, Anna, Diana, Eleanor, Jennifer, Juliet, Penelope, Helen, Fiona.
Stephen, Jonathan, Clive, David, Alexander, James, Alastair, Robin, Nigel, Martin, William, Hector, Richard.

Also born in the North in the mid 70s. Names in my primary school would be the same as this list except we also had a few Vickys, Rebeccas, Joannes and Pauls.

When I moved to the South East at the start of senior school these same names were popular but we also had Kelly (3 in my class at one point), Naomi, Hayley, Sharon and for the boys Gary, Wayne, Neil, Martin. I remember being quite surprised to hear so many 'exotic' names in my school!

70s and 80s Australia

-Karen
-Michelle (lots)
-Katrina (lots)
-Joanne
-Natalie
-Rachael/Rachel
-Sarah
-Penny

-Richard (lots)
-Paul
-Mark
-Ryan
-Tyler

Interesting. I was born '91 and was a Laura. I remember so many of us! Interestingly it was in the top 10 81 and 91!

www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/past-times/3852489/what-were-the-most-popular-baby-names-of-1981-1991-2001-and-2011/

Born early 90s and grew up in the SE.

There were lots of
Hannah
Emily
Laura/Lauren
Rebecca/Becky/Becca
Emma
Ellie

James
Thomas
Sam
Jonathan

Born 1962.

Girls:
Sally
Mandy
Paula
Karen
Lynda
Shelley
Janice
Judith
Sharon
Zoë

Boys:
Paul
Richard
Robert
Michael
Dale
Adrian
Graeme
Mark
Stephen
Julian

I knew multiples of:

Sarah
Rachel
Emma
Alison
Amy
Hannah
Laura

Matthew (Matt)
Stephen (Steve)
Luke
Adam
Thomas (Tom)
Simon

Same here and same names 😅
I'll add on Julie and Deborah for the girls and Brian and Keith for the boys 😉

Born mid 60s.

At school in North East in a predominantly working class area. Which definitely made a difference to names then, as the kids I know who went to schools in more affluent areas had rather more 'upmarket' names!

In my school during the 70s these were the most popular girls names:

Sharon
Tracey
Julie
Karen
Debbie
Christine
Alison
Diane
Lynn
Joanne

And the most popular boys names:

David
Mark
Gary
Ian
Tony
Christopher
Andrew
John
Steven

Born in early Seventies in New Zealand.

Lots of :

Megan
Sally
Leanne
Michelle
Angela
Alison

Stephen
Paul
Andrew
Richard
Simon
Philip

Late 70's, west of Scotland:
Emma
Claire
Alison
Sarah
Louise
Gillian
Jennifer

Andrew
Michael
James
Steven
David
Neil
Graeme/Graeme