The Next Vintage Wave: 1920s Stars Still Sleeping

Nov 6, 2026 Abigail Adams, Editorial writer

The vintage revival has a rhythm. Violet, Hazel and Ella were top-100 names in the 1920s, sank out of sight by the 1980s, and are top-30 names again now — roughly a hundred years after their peaks, exactly as the "100-year rule" of baby naming predicts.

Which raises the obvious question: who's next?

If the rule holds, the next wave comes from a specific pool — the other big names of the 1920s that have not come back yet. We went through the data and found them: girls' names that ranked in the top 60 in the 1920s and are still ranked below #1,900 in 2025. Twelve names. This is the watchlist.

The sleeping twelve

Best 1920s rank → 2025 rank (babies):

Doris — #6 (1929) → #3,209 (16 babies)
Mildred — #6 (1920) → #2,104 (44)
Jean — #12 (1926) → #2,601 (27)
Dolores — #14 (1929) → #2,451 (31)
Gladys — #22 (1920) → #3,472 (13)
Norma — #24 (1928) → #2,106 (44)
Edna — #26 (1920) → #2,349 (34)
Pauline — #36 (1920) → #3,408 (14)
Marion — #42 (1922) → #2,249 (38)
Geraldine — #43 (1929) → #2,456 (31)
Donna — #47 (1929) → #1,918 (53)
Juanita — #48 (1924) → #3,146 (17)

Read that table twice, because it doesn't sink in the first time. Doris — the sixth most popular girls' name in America in 1929 — was given to 16 babies in 2025. Gladys, a top-25 name within living memory of the grandparents of today's parents, got 13.

Who's closest to waking up?

Donna is the nearest to the surface: #1,918, with 53 babies — the only one of the twelve above 50. She is also the youngest-feeling of the group, a name whose peak stretched into the 1950s and 60s in many families' memory, which may be exactly what still holds her back: she doesn't read as antique yet, just dated.

At the other end, Doris and Gladys are the deepest sleepers. Both were enormous — Doris at #6, Gladys at #22 — and both are now at 16 and 13 babies respectively. By the logic of the 100-year rule they are the most "due" names in America, and by the evidence of the chart they are also the most resisted.

The middle of the table is where the interesting bets sit: Norma and Edna, two-syllable, vowel-ending, right in the sound family of the names that already revived — and Marion, which has the advantage of never having completely vanished (38 babies) and a unisex history to draw on.

The six who aren't sleeping — they're gone

One honest boundary to this list. Six more names from the 1920s girls' top 60 don't appear above because they can't: they have fallen out of the data entirely, below the five-baby reporting line. Phyllis (best #24), Thelma (#30), Ethel (#30), Bernice (#39), Gertrude (#42) and Bertha (#57) received fewer than five babies in 2025 — possibly none.

A revival can start from 13 babies. Whether it can start from zero is a different question, and so far the data says the sleeping names wake and the vanished ones don't.

Our advice: If you want a vintage name before the vintage crowd gets to it, this table is the whole game. Pick from the sleeping twelve and you get a name with a real history, a real chart, and a guarantee of uniqueness that no "rare name" listicle can match — Donna if you want the safest of the sleepers, Doris or Norma if you want the boldest. What you are betting on is timing: the 100-year rule says these names are due this decade. The chart says they haven't moved yet. Both things are true, and the gap between them is the opportunity.

The full curves: Doris, Edna, Norma — and the names that already woke up, in our baby names by decade archive.