Shelba — girls' name

What the Data Says About Shelba

The Social Security Administration has registered 2,136 babies named Shelba between 1935 and 1982, spanning 48 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a girl's name, Shelba currently falls outside the top 1,000 girls' names for 1982. The name reached its historical peak in 1937, when 344 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Shelba performed strongest in the 1930s, accumulating 970 births during that ten-year window. Across the 6 decades of recorded activity, Shelba shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in North Carolina, which accounts for 225 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by Georgia and West Virginia. In total, SSA state-level files list Shelba in 18 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Shelba 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 2,136 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.