"Tristan" now feminine given name

[Barbara Need]

>Except for JFK, I've never known a "John" who was called "Jack."  In
>the first class I ever taught I had a "Jack," but that was actually
>his given name.  So far as I can recall, I've known only one other
>"Jack" (also his given name), and that was in the '50s.

My great-uncle, John Wood Logan, was "Uncle Jack". This does not,
however, contradict the position that the is not a current
phenomenon: he was born in the 1890s and died in the 1960s or 1970s.

Barbara

>   JL
>
>sagehen <sagehen at WESTELCOM.COM> wrote:
>
>John was certainly, mid-century, the most common boy's given name, it was
>nearly always nicknamed "Jack." I can't remember ever knowing a John who
>wasn't Jack from the '30s to the '70s. This might have been at least
>partly because "john" was also the most common designation for the toilet.
>Shortening and nicknaming seems to be less common now than fifty years ago.
>Perhaps due to more parental management of kids' lives.
>A. Murie

(I don't know if the attributions are correct--editing e-mail can be a mess! B)

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