Bedford — boys' name

What the Data Says About Bedford

The Social Security Administration has registered 1,240 babies named Bedford between 1880 and 2022, spanning 143 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Bedford currently falls outside the top 1,000 boys' names for 2022. The name reached its historical peak in 1924, when 41 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Bedford performed strongest in the 1920s, accumulating 305 births during that ten-year window. Across the 14 decades of recorded activity, Bedford shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in Tennessee, which accounts for 99 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by Kentucky and Mississippi. In total, SSA state-level files list Bedford in 6 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Bedford in our reference dataset. These figures derive from SSA's annual national and state-level name files, which include any name appearing at least five times in a given year or state-year; names below that threshold are suppressed for privacy and therefore excluded from the totals shown here. The 1,240 total represents a lower bound — actual usage may be higher in years or states where the count fell below the disclosure floor. This page is provided for informational and research purposes only and does not constitute personal, legal, or naming advice.