Popular names when you went to school

One of my best friends (not a boyfriend) at college was called
Nigel.

It's funny, isn't it that we associate names with peoplewe shouldn't. A horrid girl called Susan sat behind me at primary school but I've met some lovely Susans since then.

Quite a few Christine's, Helens, Steven's. And one name I particulary loathed was Nigel because a Nigel was plonked next to me in class and he was already an established mysoginist at the age of 8.
I had the last laugh though: despite his thoroughly disgusting behaviour towards me and the other girls he was inclined to wet himself on a regular basis.
Karma, I suppose.

Gillian or Jillian, 3 in my class, Susan, Susannah, Christine, Margaret, Jean, Sonia, Only one Karen and one Sharon. The teachers didn’t know how to pronounce them! A couple of Brenda’s, Julia, Patricia.
Boys names from junior school were David, Paul, John, Peter, Michael.
Can’t remember any more from the late 1950s!

I went to Catholic schools so there were lots of saints names - Patrick, Paul, Peter, Matthew, Mary, Margaret, etc

I'm a 1956 baby called Anne...very popular because of Princess Anne.
My friends were a mixture of Anne, Jane, Susan and Heather.

for me, born in early 60's started school mid 60's. These are 5 each I can think of off-hand.

Amanda, Marilyn, Theresa, Janet, Cathy
John, Joey, Doug, Glen, Wayne

I have a French name, which isn't so French that there was one other in another class.

I can't believe how many have listed "Susan"!
I knew one Susan that I can remember.

Did others who were at Catholic schools have Susans?

We had more Bernadettes than Susan's!

I hated my name Gail because I never met anyone with my name, and I could never get a pencil or a pencil case with my name on it, I would have treasured a pen, or a pencil. There were loads of Susan's, Carol's, Linda's, Sheila's they all had pencils lol ,even today I have met very few people with my name

I heard interview with Sebastian Coe who said with a name like that when he was a boy you learned to run fast. I always liked the name, but I guess then it would have been unusual.

Katherine, Penelope, Patricia, Jocelyn, Elizabeth, Jane, Sandra, Marietta, Anne, Susan,Suzanne, Vivian,(sic) Josephine, Mary, Theresa, Wendy, Isabel, Jill, and many more……
Jonathan, Nicholas, Simon, Roderick, James, Andrew, Richard, David, Julian, Christopher, Clive, William, John, Desmond, Michael, Stephen, Anthony and more…. !!

Janet, Susan, Valerie, Barbara, Hilary, Elizabeth, Patricia, Marion, but there was one Cherry and one Wendy.

My best friends were Joanna, Josephine and Jackie.

1940s boys’ names at my primary school included 2 Maurices, Rex, Bryan, Peter, Alan, and Leslie who was Scottish. Boys in my road included Adrian and Kenneth.

I've just googled Collette -
this name actually derives from the esteemed Greek name Nicholas. Collette is a diminutive of the name Nicolette

As I always wanted to be called Nicola then perhaps Collette wasn't so bad after all! 🇨🇵

Hello, I was Yvette

JamesandJon33

We also were given French name, similar to our own. No French equivalent to mine so I was Marthe …hated it.

Marthe - meet Collette 🙂
I didn't like that either, I wanted to be Claudine.

Linda Carol Susan and Karen for girlß Stephen and Raymond do or boys circa 1970

We also were given French name, similar to our own. No French equivalent to mine so I was Marthe …hated it.

We were also given French names. My name is Elaine, which many of you have mentioned from your classes, but I have not met many other Elaines. I would like to have been called Héléne, which is the French version of my name but was saddled with Nicole, which I really disliked, because my birthday is on St. Nicholas's day.

Ursula (loved that name)
I knew two Ursulas, not from school though.
One was German, the other had a German mother.

I love Ursula, too.
I think it means something to do with bears.

From my English shire school in the early 60s.

Karen. We had four in our year.
Angela x 2
Linda
Beverly
Susan x 2
Jill
Gillian
Jane x 3
Brenda
Patricia
Shona
Ursula (loved that name)
Christine

Steven x 2
Mark
Michael
Martin
Gary
Glynn
Anthony
Peter
Douglas
Shaun
Christopher
Terrance
Paul
David x2
Angus

That's the dilemma when you're a teacher having a new baby ...... all the names you run through in your head remind you of a child at school who was either naughty or a pain!

Oi!

Oh, yes, also Gary. Every Gary l came across in school was always badly behaved.

Karen !
Always lots of Karens in my class 1964-1976