It’s around the 250th most popular girls name as of last year. For comparison, I checked some names I grew up with and it’s more popular than Catherine (at around 300). And more popular than Jane, Rebecca, and Nicole.
In the mid 1990s, I worked with a woman who named her son Dakotah. That’s the only one I can think of that I knew personally.
The hell you say?
Oprah’s name was a misspelling of Orpah in the first place. So there’s that.
I know (or at least, knew) a guy named Dakota; he’d be in his late 20s or early 30s at this point.
Orpah was a woman in the Bible. According to Oprah herself, her name was supposed be be Orpah, but was misspelled.
Dak Prescott, starting QB for the Dallas Cowboys, is short for Dakota.
On this list, it’s:
Dakota #258
Jane #290
Rebecca #296
Catherine #328
That’s from SSA (Social Security Administration) data in 2022.
Dakota is not a lot
Not common now, no. It’s about 1200 births for 2022. Its peak appears to have been 2006, where it cracked the Top 200 at 190, with 1800 births to that name. I don’t know why the info from the SSA does not seem to align with the graph shown before. It is based on Social Security card applications, if that makes a difference.
Here’s where I pulled my data:
I can’t seem to directly link to the results, but if you type in “Dakota” in the “Popularity of a name” column and click on “1960 & Later”, you’ll find the data I got.
My ex-stepdaughter’s brother-in-law’s son is a Dakota. I think he’s a teenager now.
(and @Kent_Clark) I wish I’d known that at the time!
My brain broke trying to follow that branch of your family tree.
I think there were 4 in the Lil’wrekkers graduating class
Dakota is basic. Now, Lakota is a cool name for a kid.
Something like that happened to my Uncle, Conard.
He HATED that name so much, because he got teased about it. As soon as he could, he legally changed his name to just “Con.”
Ah, for male names, it seems to have hit #56 in 1995, with 6575 male Dakotas being born that year. ETA: Still, doesn’t line up at all with the previous graph where female Dakotas dominate. I’m confused.
And an apartment building.
Oh I forgot about that. Good catch.
My favorite charactor on The Electric Company!
Had a dog named Lakota one time.