Top Baby Names of the 1940s

The most popular baby names from 1940 to 1949, ranked by total births during the decade.

What the Data Says About the 1940s

The Social Security Administration's 1940s national files cumulate 17,163,128 births across the top 50 boy and top 50 girl names for the decade. James led the boys with 795,775 births, while Mary led the girls with 640,080 births. The top 50 boys of the 1940s collectively captured 9,463,231 births versus 7,699,897 for the top 50 girls, the typical SSA pattern in which a narrower set of boy names dominates a wider share of total registrations. Names occurring fewer than five times in a given year are suppressed by SSA for privacy, so these totals represent only the public-disclosure portion of the decade's actual naming distribution.

The 1940s occupied a specific cultural moment in U.S. naming history. The early 20th century (1920s–1940s) saw biblical and traditional names dominate, with a small top-10 cluster capturing a large share of total births across all regions.

Decade totals on this page aggregate SSA national name-year records across all ten years of the 1940s. Because the SSA excludes names with fewer than five annual occurrences, the true number of unique names given during the 1940s is substantially higher than the top-50 lists shown here, particularly for rare and emerging names that never crossed the disclosure threshold. Each spelling is also tracked as a separate entry, so combined pools (e.g., Sophia + Sofia, Aiden + Ayden) would produce different rankings. This page is provided for informational and research purposes and does not constitute naming, legal, or genealogical advice.

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Top Boy Names Boy

Rank Name Total Births
1 James 795,775
2 Robert 758,126
3 John 711,614
4 William 556,478
5 Richard 477,476
6 David 426,372
7 Charles 361,772
8 Thomas 350,775
9 Michael 336,568
10 Ronald 282,489
11 Larry 255,908
12 Donald 247,834
13 Joseph 230,285
14 Gary 217,772
15 George 209,013
16 Kenneth 198,553
17 Paul 183,364
18 Edward 174,801
19 Jerry 167,257
20 Dennis 162,114
21 Frank 119,417
22 Daniel 112,778
23 Raymond 109,076
24 Roger 107,602
25 Stephen 106,812
26 Gerald 103,342
27 Walter 83,728
28 Harold 82,176
29 Steven 81,204
30 Douglas 80,760
31 Lawrence 80,461
32 Terry 76,965
33 Wayne 75,131
34 Arthur 73,968
35 Jack 73,919
36 Carl 72,739
37 Henry 72,488
38 Willie 72,422
39 Bruce 72,097
40 Joe 72,015
41 Peter 69,330
42 Billy 67,833
43 Roy 65,648
44 Ralph 64,983
45 Anthony 64,825
46 Jimmy 63,523
47 Albert 60,278
48 Bobby 58,890
49 Eugene 57,275
50 Johnny 57,200

Top Girl Names Girl

Rank Name Total Births
1 Mary 640,080
2 Linda 531,660
3 Barbara 425,271
4 Patricia 411,412
5 Carol 292,333
6 Sandra 265,538
7 Nancy 252,061
8 Sharon 221,237
9 Judith 218,037
10 Susan 212,016
11 Betty 194,623
12 Carolyn 181,858
13 Margaret 173,028
14 Shirley 171,780
15 Judy 167,719
16 Karen 167,700
17 Donna 165,523
18 Kathleen 152,981
19 Joyce 151,494
20 Dorothy 132,257
21 Janet 130,755
22 Diane 122,878
23 Janice 118,893
24 Joan 117,708
25 Elizabeth 116,551
26 Brenda 112,415
27 Gloria 105,055
28 Virginia 99,000
29 Marilyn 98,977
30 Martha 95,384
31 Beverly 95,122
32 Helen 90,742
33 Bonnie 86,886
34 Ruth 85,666
35 Frances 85,448
36 Jean 80,363
37 Ann 76,797
38 Phyllis 76,143
39 Pamela 73,121
40 Jane 72,537
41 Alice 72,392
42 Peggy 72,122
43 Cheryl 70,959
44 Doris 64,144
45 Catherine 62,086
46 Elaine 60,105
47 Cynthia 58,061
48 Marie 57,521
49 Lois 56,854
50 Connie 56,604

Nearby Decade Rankings

Compare the 1940s with adjacent decades and annual rankings

1930s Top Names
Top 50 by decade
1950s Top Names
Top 50 by decade
Year 1945
Mid-decade rankings
All Rankings
Browse ranking lists

Compare 1940s leaders: James vs Mary → or pick any two names →

Source: U.S. Social Security Administration, Baby Names from Social Security Card Applications, National Data (ssa.gov/oact/babynames).

Source: SSA Decade Rollups, aggregated across 1940–1949.

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.

Data sourced from the U.S. Social Security Administration. See our methodology for details.