Boy Names

Brisk, preppy York is an underused classic with the potential to really shine in the 21st century. It's most familiar as a place name — York is a city in England — and surname. New York City and State were named after the Duke of York.

Woodsy names are fashionable for boys, as are surnames and occupational names, so Forester scores on all three. It can also be spelled Forrester.

Balthasar was one of the biblical Three Kings who visited the infant Jesus, also used by Shakespeare and in the oil-rich Getty family; offbeat and intriguing. Balthazar is another, equally appropriate spelling.

The girls have Apple, Plum, Peaches, Cherry, and Berry: here's one variety of fruit suitable for a boy.

A possible Christmas name for a baby boy, if you find Noel too mundane. But we fear it doesn't sound very festive.

An evocative, windswept choice that is part of the third generation of western-influenced names, picking up where first Jesse and then Dakota left off, though with a slight feminine edge.

This softer version of Adolf is sadly still off-limits due to the connotations with Hitler.

Connolly, an alternate spelling of Connelly, could make a livelier and less common substitute for Connor.

Unseen in the USA since 1901, Boston rocketed back into the Top 1000 in 2004 and, like other place-names such as Brooklyn, London and Paris, is now a reliable presence on the list.

Gentle giant Rubeus Hagrid is the groundskeeper at Hogwarts in the Harry Potter novels (probably after Hagrid Rubes, the equally kind ancient Greek mythological giant), but that's not the only reason this name could prove a playground liability.

This recently coined respelling of Cole darkens its image.

From Haruki Murakami's Kafka on the Shore, the story of a boy named Kafka -- crow in Czech.

Many African tribes have a tradition of naming children for the day or time they were born -- Friday, Afternoon -- a practice finding new life in the Western world as word names become more popular.

There's a whole quarry of rocky names parents are now considering: Slate, Flint, etc. , but this one is particularly hard-edged and problematic.

Forget Patience and Charity: Here's a Colonial name (and sentiment) that seems perfect for modern times.

One of the classic hippie word names. In the 1970s, actors Barbara Hershey and David Carradine gave this name to their son...who later changed it to Tom.

Ron Burgundy was Will Ferrell's fictional helmet-haired newsman, but this color name is much more suited to a girl.

A traditional French male name that could, with American pronunciation, become an admirable word name.