My poor husband is stuck with Lavern as a middle name.  It's a family name but his father didn't want to have his son be a Jr.  When his wife had my husband she was mad at her husband for not being there and she named him the same name as his dad.  So his family calls him Jr. and he NEVER tells anyone his middle name if he can help it.  His mom just didn't think that the person she was actually hurting was her newborn baby son stuck with Lavern as a middle name.

Lavern....ouch.

 

I have to disagree with Sue, and Cindi...I love family names!  Both my sons are named after their grandfathers.  I wouldn't have it any other way!  To me theres nothing like a solid traditional family name, and honoring those that came before you in your family.

 

I agree about giving grandfather's names and avoiding the jr.  My husband hates being called Jr.  My nephew is also a jr. and when my sister calls out to him and uses Jr. my husband keeps looking up to answer also!!

 

My son's middle name is for my dad.  Plus he was also born on my dad's birthday.  My dad said it's the best birthday gift he ever got.

Speaking of family names, my father's name is Hercules!  That's actually his father's name (he was known as Herc) and my father grew up as Gerard Joseph (Jerry).  It wasn't until I was looking at old family papers that I found out that he's really Hercules Joseph Gerard!  I gave my father a hard time (I was a teenager) so he told me that to continue the tradition, my real middle name was Herculine.  I cried!!  Then he told me he was fibbing.  Phew!

And Lolo, what an honor to have Loretta Young be your godmother and namesake!  She was such a beautiful lady!!  (p.s. my godmother is a Loretta, too!)

I have an autographed photo of her holding me when I was just a baby, maybe I'll have it scanned and post it - it's really quite an honor.

LOL @ CindiLu...I think George Foreman is WAY beyond narcicisstic(sp?)!  What a nut!  I dont see anything bad about using the father's name for one son though. Christine...your post made me laugh too!  I would actually have to re-consider naming my sons after my father, if his name was Hercules.  But your Dad's middle name is my all time favorite boys'/mens name: Joseph.  I dont care for Joe, or Joey, But I love Joseph. 

i think george named all his sons after him because he cant remember any other name  roflmao

 

my sons middle name is after his great grandfather

he died before my son was born and i wanted to honor my grandfather, with the great grandchild he never got to hold.

I like Joseph, too, and I feel the same way about just liking it as Joseph.  There are a few names that I prefer in their long form, like Jonathan, Geoffrey, etc...

 

As for Hercules, it actually sounds really nice when spoken with the french accent (our family is originally from New Brunswick).  I toyed with it for my son's middle name (his first name is Etienne) but it wouldn't sound good at all Americanized!  So Etienne has Gerard for the middle name, and he's very thankful! lol  (p.s. named our daughter Montana...not very French, huh?!)

 

We have a tradition of the 1st born being named after the father in this case it's Johnston. No one has ever called him junior. It must be an American thing.

My oceanography professor had us cracking up in lecture the other day, talking about the scientist Harold Hess and then digressing to tell us that good old Hessie always reminded him of his friend Mike Legg, whose father's name is Harold.  He went on to finish with, "if you take nothing else away from this course, let it be this: if you ever have the power to name a child, please PLEASE think about what you're doing!  Think of Harry Legg."  Hilarious as it was, it's still kinda sad.  The actress Shannyn Sossaman named her kid "Audio Science."  What's that about?