Bette

Where Bette comes from

Bette hasn't made it into the dictionaries we draw on, and nobody well known enough for an encyclopedia has carried it yet — so for now its story is the one the SSA record tells. Names that spell a familiar sound a new way often live here for a while before anyone writes them down.

  • Vowel-ended
Along the way
  1. 1896
    First appearance
    #1,583 among girls, 5 babies — the first year at least five got the name.
  2. 1908
    Bette Davis born
    American actress
  3. 1923
    Peak, #148
    1,693 babies named Bette — more than any year before or since.
  4. 1930
    The fade
    The first year with half the peak's births — down to #221.
  5. 1945
    Bette Midler born
    American singer and actress
In the dictionary

No dictionary entry for this spelling — which is its own kind of rare.

Namesakes
  • Bette Davis · American actress, 1908–1989
  • Bette Midler · American singer and actress, born 1945
  • Bette Nesmith Graham · Inventor, businesswoman, 1924–1980
  • Bette Korber · American computational biologist, born 1950
  • Bette Ford · American actress, born 1927

Sources: the origin note and dictionary entry are quoted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); the namesakes come from Wikidata (CC0); the milestones are worked out from the SSA record.