# Odd name? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 10, 2013, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806 "2013-01-10T23:19:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Anny\_Middon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bc79bd/32.png) [@Anny\_Middon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anny_Middon)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2013, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/1 "2013-01-10T23:19:15Z")
Being basically cheap, the book I’ve been (re)reading on my smart phone lately is Agatha Christie’s The Secret Adversary. A major plotline relies on a woman’s name – Jane Finn. > [@](#): > > “Funny scraps one does overhear,” murmured Tommy. “I passed two Johnnies in the street to-day talking about some one called Jane Finn. Did you ever hear such a name?” Why is this considered such an odd name? It seems fairly normal to me. Is this a post-WWI thing? Or maybe it’s odd in Great Britain and not here? (I remember being confused about why people in another Christie book remarked that a brother and sister were Pip and Emma; it was years later before I figured it out.) ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2013, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/2 "2013-01-10T23:32:49Z")
A name does not have to be particularly odd for it to be a remarkable coincidence to hear strangers mentioning it when you have just recently come across it yourself, in a different context. ---
**Author:** ![UncleFred](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f0a364/32.png) [@UncleFred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleFred)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/3 "2013-01-11T02:45:42Z")
All I can think of is that “Mickey Finn” has connotations here in the US. (More so long ago) ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/4 "2013-01-11T03:15:55Z")
I didn’t read any connotations of oddity in the question (but I have not read the book). He just seems to be asking “I heard some guys talking about a ‘Jane Finn.’ Do you know who that is?” ---
**Author:** ![Postariti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Postariti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Postariti)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/5 "2013-01-11T05:35:59Z")
It depends on how you interpret, “Did you ever hear such a name?” I hear it as, “Such a name! It’s so strange!” Others obviously think it means, “That particular name.” ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/6 "2013-01-11T13:37:37Z")
> [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](#): > > I didn’t read any connotations of oddity in the question (but I have not read the book). He just seems to be asking “I heard some guys talking about a ‘Jane Finn.’ Do you know who that is?” Yes, that’s all it is. It’s not a comment on the name being odd, just a slightly old-fashioned turn of phrase. “Did you ever hear such a name?” just means “Have you ever heard that name?” ---
**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/7 "2013-01-11T15:55:08Z")
It’s similar in phrasing to “Did you ever hear such a thing?” which usually implies an unusual event. I can see the confusion. ---
**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/8 "2013-01-11T16:18:38Z")
> [@Anny\_Middon](#): > > I remember being confused about why people in another Christie book remarked that a brother and sister were Pip and Emma; it was years later before I figured it out. Can you save me a few years and tell me now? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/9 "2013-01-11T17:26:18Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#): > > Can you save me a few years and tell me now? 🙂 “Pip Emma” was RAF slang for “p.m.”, as in times. Ack Emma was a.m. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/10 "2013-01-11T17:28:54Z")
> [@Postariti](#): > > I hear it as, “Such a name! It’s so strange!” You have to keep in mind that this was written 90 years ago, and the language to modern ears is a little funky. I see three other remarkable indicators in just that tiny bit you quoted: “Funny scraps one does overhear” - this just sounds old-fashioned. I think it’s the “one does overhear” as opposed to “you overhear.” “to-day” - old spelling of “today.” “some one” - not “someone”? That should give you a clue that you may have to interpret “Did you ever hear such a name?” in a way that you’re not accustomed to. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/11 "2013-01-11T20:25:10Z")
What is being asked is, “Did you ever hear of her?” Tommy is wondering if Jane Finn was some sort of celebrity that he hadn’t heard of. In addition, when he heard the same name said by two different people in different contexts, that struck him as a strange coincidence. The name only has to be a little out of the ordinary: “John Smith” would have been too common to notice. ---
**Author:** ![Anny\_Middon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bc79bd/32.png) [@Anny\_Middon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anny_Middon)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/12 "2013-01-11T21:26:46Z")
I guess I was a bit too concise in my quoting. Tommy and Tuppence have run into each other on the street. The last time they saw each other was during the war. They go to tea: > [@](#): > > The place was full, and they wandered about looking for a table, catching odds and ends of conversation as they did so. > > “And–do you know, she sat down and CRIED when I told her she couldn’t have the flat after all.” “It was simply a BARGAIN, my dear! Just like the one Mabel Lewis brought from Paris----” > > “Funny scraps one does overhear,” murmured Tommy. “I passed two Johnnies in the street to-day talking about some one called Jane Finn. Did you ever hear such a name?” > > But at that moment two elderly ladies rose and collected parcels, and Tuppence deftly ensconced herself in one of the vacant seats. This is the first time the name Jane Finn is mentioned in the book. I would have thought that if Tommy wanted to mention how names come up he would have said something like, “Wonder who Mabel Lewis is?” It just seems to me there has to be something unusual about the name Jane Finn, or why else would Tommy have brought it up? Of course maybe it’s just poor plotting on Christie’s part. In Chapter 2 Tuppence meet with a man, decides to give him a false name and, having forgotten the conversation with Tommy, says she’s Jane Finn, thinking she made it up. The man she’s meeting with is shocked and thinks she’s there to blackmail him. In what is a very clunky coincidence, the man is one of the two Johnnies that Tommy had overheard. The whole Jann Finn mystery is much of the plot. But it would have been a lot simpler if Christie had used the name Jane Finn in one of the overheard conversations at the tea shop. Which is what leads me to believe there must be something about the name that is odd enough for Tommy to have mentioned it. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/13 "2013-01-11T22:53:45Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > “Pip Emma” was RAF slang for “p.m.”, as in times. Ack Emma was a.m. The brother and sister in question were twins, born just after 12 noon, and their mother joked she was going to call them “Pip” and “Emma”. The novel is _A Murder Is Announced_. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2013, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/14 "2013-01-11T23:33:12Z")
Agatha Christie evidently thought the name was odd. From [here](http://agathachristie.com/site-media/downloads/Reading%20Group%20Guide%20for%20And%20Then%20There%20Were%20None.htm): > [@](#): > > It was often the most everyday events and casual observations that triggered a new plot. Her second book The Secret Adversary stemmed from a conversation overheard in a tea shop: “Two people were talking at a table nearby, discussing somebody called Jane Fish . . . That, I thought, would make a good beginning to a story – a name overheard at a tea shop – an unusual name, so that whoever heard it remembered it. A name like Jane Fish, or perhaps Jane Finn would be even better.” ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2013, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-name/646806/15 "2013-01-12T08:01:55Z")
Well, according to [How Many of Me?,](http://howmanyofme.com/) there are currently only 30 people in the US named Jane Finn. 23,617 people have the surname Finn; 393,883 people are named Jane; but only 30 Jane Finns. Contrast this with 3,470 people named Jane Smith; 2,015 named Jane Brown; 430 named Jane Rogers; and, surprisingly, 17 named Jane Doe. I have no idea what all that tells you about this. Frankly, I just wanted an excuse to go play at that site. 🙂