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Shirley

in the US

There are 489,173 people with the first name "Shirley" in the United States.

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Ranking in the US

NameRank
Shirley 69
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  1. is 65th most common Angela
  2. is 66th most common Pamela
  3. is 67th most common Gregory
  4. is 68th most common Chris
  5. is 69th most common Shirley
  6. is 70th most common Brenda
  7. is 71st most common Diane
  8. is 72nd most common Debra
  9. is 73rd most common Raymond

Similar Names and Nicknames

Shirlee, Shirl, Shirly, Shirlie, Shirle, Shirla, Shirely, Shirelle, Shirell, Shirrell

Most Common Last Names for Shirley

Smith, Johnson, Jones, Williams, Brown, Davis, Miller, Wilson, Jackson, Thomas

Meaning & History

(female), formerly (male) Transferred use of the surname, in origin a local name from any of the various places (in the West Midlands, Derbyshire, Hampshire, and Surrey) named in Old English from scīr ‘county, shire’ or scīr ‘bright’ + lēah ‘wood, clearing’. It was given by Charlotte Brontë to the heroine of her novel Shirley (1849). According to the novel, her parents had selected the name in prospect of a male child and used it regardless. Shirley had earlier been used as a boy's name (Charlotte Brontë refers to it as a ‘masculine cognomen’), but this literary influence fixed it firmly as a girl's name. It was strongly reinforced during the 1930s and 40s by the popularity of the child film star Shirley Temple (b. 1928).

Recent Searches for "Shirley" in the US

Since June 2009
116,150

Most Popular Search

Shirley Smith (2,685 searches)
Source: Current searches and listings for US adults on WhitePages.

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