Over the last 20 years, over 750,000 people in Alberta have filled in a blank space on an unsentimental government form and named a baby. Many will have wondered where the name would travel and what it would come to mean. They drew on any nunber of sources, from family tradition to popular culture to religion to the natural world to the whim of the moment.
From 1990 to 2010, Albertans used 11,534 individual boys’ names and 43,481 individual girls’ names. 695 boys’ names were used only once in Alberta over the two decades, compared to 30,219 girls’ names. (This is rooted to some extent in the variety of spelling of girls’ names: Brooklyn had 35 spellings, and Brittany had no fewer than 60, from Britanee to Brittyne).
Related: 90 years of Ontario baby names Interactive
Baby name data is released annually by Service Alberta, and Global News used records going back to 1990 to build these searchable interactives showing trends for each name over the two decades. Some are in a long-term decline, like Thomas and Megan, while others, like Olivia, have been steadily more popular. Some, like Ethan and Madison, had a peak of popularity a few years ago.
Top Alberta names, 2011
| Place | Girls | Boys |
| 1 | Olivia | Liam |
| 2 | Sophia | Ethan |
| 3 | Emma | Mason |
| 4 | Emily | Lucas |
| 5 | Ava | Jacob |
| 6 | Chloe | Benjamin |
| 7 | Abigail | Alexander |
| 8 | Lily | Noah |
| 9 | Brooklyn | William |
| 10 | Sophie | Logan |
Girls named after concepts or qualities, 1990-2010
Not to scale
Girls with names related to horticulture, 1990-2010
Not to scale
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