Today being National Aunts and Uncles Day (who knew, right?), here’s a shout-out to some of the most memorable aunts in both literature and pop culture– the sweet and the sour, the doting and the demanding, the over-indulgent and the overbearing—with, in literature at least, the unfortunate majority being the more domineering.

Especially in Victorian literature, with its plethora of poor orphans, aunts would often step in as surrogate moms.  Unfortunately, some of the more notable ones are known to us by their surnames only.

Here are some of the most memorable, from sources as varied as from novels to comics.

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This year once more, and again with apologies to our dear Britberries,  we honor some of the (more interestingly named) heroes in the struggle of the US to gain its independence from the mother country, as well as some of the more unusually named Signers of the Declaration of Independence.  Here, some early patriotic baby names:

Women

BETSY (Elizabeth) Ross—even though she may not have actually made the first American flag

DEBORAH Sampson — first known female to impersonate a man in order to join the army and take part in combat

LYDIA Darragh – Quaker woman who (probably) warned Washington of an impending attack

MERCY Otis Warren –a political writer and propagandist who authored plays and poems advocating independence

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