Melville — boys' name

What the Data Says About Melville

The Social Security Administration has registered 2,269 babies named Melville between 1880 and 1981, spanning 102 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Melville currently falls outside the top 1,000 boys' names for 1981. The name reached its historical peak in 1918, when 77 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Melville performed strongest in the 1920s, accumulating 526 births during that ten-year window. Across the 11 decades of recorded activity, Melville shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in New York, which accounts for 209 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by California and Illinois. In total, SSA state-level files list Melville in 10 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Melville 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 2,269 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.