Names are getting ridiculous.

Take Jane, a perfectly good girl's name, but in some misguided desire to make her baby Jane the most unique baby in the world, a mother today will spell that name Ja'ne, Jayne, Jayenne, Jay'n, and just about any other combination of letters that she hopes will bring a few seconds of extra recognition to the child.

The little girl gets the extra attention, but can't learn to spell her own name until she's at least in the 6th grade.

It's nearly as bad as the trend a decade ago to name children after soap opera characters. Days of Our Lives may die, but the characters will live on in public records and as a burden hundreds of children will have to carry for a lifetime.

It was the same in the Hippie era. Thirty- and 40-something people are walking around today with names like Chastity, Freedom, Love, Peace, even Woodstock!

So far, I haven't heard of any child of the 1990s being named Shuttle, Moonscape or Mars Rover, but it wouldn't surprise me to come upon one any day in some elementary classroom.

Name selection is tough, of course, and it puts a huge burden on parents. However, all you have to do is look at a grown man or woman and imagine calling them what you're about to call your baby, and you know what the effect of the name might be.

I didn't know that this has always been the case until I started working with the Grayson County Historical Society on a book they're compiling called “Historical Sketches and Family Histories of Grayson County.” The book's about to go into its second printing and about 70 new family histories have been added.

The names people used make you wonder where they ever heard of the name before. Some are obvious, of course, like Washington, Jefferson, Martin, Van, Burin, Jackson. Presidents' names got used a lot. And, there was the Bible. Genesis is full of early begetting and name-calling. But certain names from the Bible aren't used much. There are lots of Matthews, Lukes, Thomases and Johns, but very few Marks.

Mary was often used as a girl's name, but almost always these girls were called Polly. One can only surmise that naming a girl after the Holy Mother of Jesus was too presumptuous. After thinking about it for a few Sundays, parents noticed the child didn't fit the scripture's description of Mary, so they backed off to Polly. It is unclear why almost every Margaret became a Peggy.

But where did they find Marvel and Melon to tack onto two boys? Imagine if you were a boy and had to live with a name like Blossie or Zacsy! One girl, I suppose, was born in January, since she was named Snowy.

Urban and Mountjoy had a mom who didn't want her boys to be overlooked. And the poor little girl who had to grow up to be a woman with a name like Dimple could always point to another girl with a worse one -- Dullgenda!

There were the twin girls named Cattie and Mattie, who had a cousin named Beadie. Too bad none of them met that boy named Zanol! Or Zetro. Or that boy named Dollie. The list goes on and on.

How historical folk in Grayson County found these names is a mystery. And maybe that's it. Life was pretty dull, filled with hard work and lonely in pioneer times, so parents would dredge up names like these:

Jeroboam, Umbalina, Anslem, Westward, Meoma, Bidsey, Tarrott, Palestine, Paradine, Crittie, Penolia, Barbashia, Vorvanick, Ranson, Rheuelma, Deolie, Zillie, Vollie Buck (a boy), Fountain, Art Denmark, Larahan, Anthantios, Barleashia, Ormanda, Monarchy, Montana, Carolina America, Montiacilla, Tapley, Piney, Edalow, Ree, Add, Appalone, Alfa, Eudoxia....

Some Grayson County names have been lost to history. They are victims of the late 1800s-early 1900s habit of calling men by their first two initials. It was the “Progressive Era,” and men who had made it in the world, usually in business or farming, would start signing things with only their first two initials. There are all kinds of O.B. and Z.C. and V.N. tacked onto deeds, bills of sale, etc. (I suspect many of these men had names they couldn't live with.)

My own middle name comes from an uncle of mine. Mom, the youngest child in her family, always looked up to her older brother, Clinton Albert, so I got stuck with Albert. It has caused me great grief because of Prince Albert pipe tobacco. I was no prince, but Albert was always in the can!

Royce is a fairly common last name, but not in my family. I believe it came from one of mom's favorite books, yes, a soap opera kind of novel called “Lena Rivers.”

I have no clue where a 6-year-old great-nephew, Jacob, heard the word, but he wanted to use it and didn't like saying Uncle Royce. To him, I'm Uncle Bellboy.