There are good solid names that were popular then and are popular now: Jack, for example, or Mary. We like the way they sound and we do not question them.

Sometimes names are a function of a time and place and do not gracefully weather the transition to a new age. I’m sure that there are still parents out there naming their daughters Hortense, but hopefully not many. Perhaps 50 years from now, Madison, Ava, and Hailey (all among the top baby names of 2010) will seem similarly dated.

But even Hortense has a bit of music to it, hearkening to another age when people wore white wigs and whispered conspiratorially while dancing in the parlor.

Alas, not all names can be justified and forgiven by the passage of time. I give you…

We passed the Throg’s Neck Bridge en route to Long Island last week. It is not the first time I’ve encountered this unholy string of syllables. It’s the “Throg” that really gets me, invoking as it does a caveman with his club, dragging his unwilling mate by her long, unruly hair back into the confines of his cave. But combined with the “Neck,” I am forced to contemplate some aspects of his anatomy, that shaggy stump between his shoulders and chin, besmeared with the drippings of whatever mastodon he has most recently consumed.

A bit of research reveals that Wikipedia entry is a nice enough place, and that the name “Throg’s Neck” is derived from the surname of an early settler—Rev. John Throckmorton (or Throgmorton, the history is not clear). I’m trying to decide whether “Throck’s Neck” would have been any less unpleasant. In my head, the answer is “yes,” but when you add the difficulty of voicing the “ck” sound at the end of successive words, I’d argue that the people naming this unfortunate spit of land found themselves in a no-win situation. If only the settlement had been founded by someone named Hailey.

I’m guessing that the sun would be willing to shine on a bridge called Haliey’s Neck. As it was, we made our passage under gloomy skies as befitted the context.