THE WORLD'S SHORTEST PERSONAL NAMES

TRISTAN MILLER
Darmstadt, Germany
http://www.nothingisreal.com/

People have long been fascinated with unusually long words, and unusually long names in particu-
lar. Most have at least heard of the Welsh village Uanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllan-
tysiliogogogoch, even if they can't ever hope to spell it. And among personal names, both Dmitri
Borgmann and the Guinness Book of World Records recognized a Mr. H. B. Wolfeschlegel stein-
hausenbergerdorff of Philadelphia as having the longest. (His full surname, truncated here, actually
contains 590 letters.) Comparatively less attention has been paid to the world 's shortest names. In
this article, I briefly review previous surveys of short personal names, and expand on these with
further legitimate examples drawn from joumalistic and scholarly sources. I also debunk some
urban legends and misconceptions about particular single-letter names.
Perhaps the earliest collection of unusually short names is in the first Ripley 's Believe It or Not'
book from 1929 [29] ; it lists a few one-letter place names, but alas no names of people. In 1982
A. Ross Eckler conducted an exhaustive search of US telephone directories for single-letter sur-
names, coming up with several examples (most of them probably spurious) for every letter except
Q [12]. Eckler's study was later cited by the Guinness Book of World Records, which noted that
of the 47 million names in the Social Security index, only six had a one-letter surname [25]. This
and earlier editions of Guinness note some uncommonl y short Asian surnames such as O.
Gleaned as they were from indiscriminate databases, very few of the individuals cited by Eckler and
Guinness are noteworthy for anything other than the brevity of their names. And as Eckler admits,
the overwhelming majority of his examples are probably typographical errors, or cases where a
surname and first initial were mi stakenly swapped. Many of the remainder may be fictitiou s or
assumed names rather than ones assigned at birth. In this survey, therefore, I aim for single-letter
names whose owners have attracted significant coverage in the media and in reference works-
people who are, in a word, famous, at least in some field. Sticking to this criterion should remove
any doubts about the authenticity of the names and the existence of their owners.
The names below are categorized into three sections. First are names which were assigned to the
recipient at or shortly after birth. Next come names which the owner adopted later in life; as these
are extremely numerous, I report only a few particularly famous or interesting examples. Finally,
there is a section for commonly cited single-letter names which I have been unable to verify, or
which I show to be spurious. Note that unlike Eckler, I do not restrict myself to surnames; my
survey also covers unusually short first and middle names.

Birth names

A Frank A. Camaratta, Jr_ is a chess master and former executive member of the United States
Chess Federation. According to his USCF biography, "the 'A' doesn't stand for anything" [I].

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 I assume this is his birth name rather than an adopted one, as his father's name is also given as
Frank A. Camaratta.
A (pronounced "Albin") was what a Swedish couple proposed to name their son after their first
choice, Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbblll16 (also pronounced "Albin"), was re-
jected by a district court in 1996. The court refused to approve the shorter name too, ruling that
one-letter names are prohibited in Sweden [2].
D Olympic champion hurdler William D. "Willie" Davenport's "0" doesn't stand for anything,
though he liked to tell the ladies that it was short for "dangerous" [40].
E "E" or "E" (~B) is a common Chinese surname, and one found in the classic book The Hundred
Family Surnames from the early Song Dynasty. A notable modern-day E is the mathematician
E Weinan [42]. "E" is also the transliteration of some other Chinese names written with
different characters. These include the hi storical Tang dynasty general Xue E, Ming dynasty
poet Huang E , Qing dynasty scholar Gao E, and 20th-century revolutionary Cai E, as well as
the modern-day Olympic sports shooter Gao E [42].
Than E was a Burmese singer and long-time United Nations civil servant [42] .
I According to financier and former Citigroup CEO Sanford I. "Sandy" Weill, "My mother
wanted to name me after somebody whose name started with an T, but she could n't think of
a name she liked. So she gave me the initial with the idea that after I was 21 I could choose
whatever middle name I wanted." [38]
J Glen J. Cob,," is the founder of Glen & Company, a New York- based architectural firm . In
a recent New York Times interview he stated, "The birth certificate has 'J' and a period . But
the'J' doesn't stand for anything, it's just a letter. I think it was one of my parents' rebellious
things." [24]
See also the entry for Johnny Cash under R.
o " 0 " (.£) is the Korean form of the Chinese surname Wu (3<), though it is more commonly
transcribed into the Latin alphabet as "Oh". There are dozens of famous Korean Os, including
mountaineer 0 Eun-Seon; singers 0 Hye-Rin, 0 Ha-Yeong, and 0 Yeon-Seo; painters 0
Yun and 0 Jeong-Geun ; actors 0 Man-Seok, 0 Yun-A, 0 Yeon-Su, 0 Ji-Ho, 0 Dal-Su , 0
Ji-Eun, 0 Jeong-Se, 0 Hyeon-Gyeong, and 0 Sun-Taek; general 0 Kuk-Ryol ; writers 0
Sang-Won, 0 Yeong-Su, 0 Su-Yeon, 0 Seon-Hwa, 0 Tae-Seok, 0 Gyuwon, and 0 Tak-
Ppeon; politicians 0 Yun-Gyeom, 0 Se-Hun, and 0 Jin-V; economist 0 Kil-Nam; TV host
o Sang-Mi; and athletes 0 Ha-Na, 0 Jae-Yeong, 0 Seong-Ok, 0 Yeong-Ran, 0 Se-Rim,
o Ju-Hyeon, 0 Beom-Seok, 0 Kyo-Mun, 0 Jang-Eun, and 0 Bong-Jin [42].
"0" (I ) is the Japanese fo rm of the Chinese surname Wang. As with the Korean 0, it can also
be romanized as "Oh" or " 0". Japanese Os of note include profess ional Go player 0 Rissei
and retired baseball player 6 Sadaharu [42].
R Country music legend John R. "Johnny" Cash was born simply "J. R. Cash", but when he
tried to enli st in the Air Force they insisted on a longer name. He adopted the first name "John",
leaving the "R" unexpanded [39].

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 American football player Cornelius R "C. R" Roberts usually goes by his initials, the second
of which doesn't stand for anything [18].

S Interestingly, two separate US presidents have borne one-letter names, though only one carried
that name from birth. This was Harry S. Truman, whose unigraphic middle name was meant
to honour both his grandfathers, Solomon Young and Anderson Shippe Truman [19 , 41].

T Crime novelist T. Jefferson Parker has a single-letter first name. In one interview the author
said, "My mother told me once she thought it would look good on the presidential letterhead."
[43]

U U Nagaharu was the Korean-Japanese botanist who lent his name to the triangle of U, a theory
concerning the evolution of certain mustard plants [42].

U was a king of the Goryeo dynasty who ruled Korea from 1374 to 1388 [42]. As I have
been unable to uncover any other given or family names for this king, this single-letter name is
perhaps the shortest overall for any famous personage, at least when rendered into English.

e'
In Burmese U (or (0) is how the given name is romanized in most standard transliteration
systems, though it is often also transcribed as "00" . Examples of famous Burmese people
bearing this name include painter Paw U Thet, actor Win U, historian Thant Myint U, and
politicians Ba U and Tin Aung Myint U.

Adopted names

The adoption of a fictitious first or middle initial is common in the creative and performing arts,
where many professional guilds and associations require that no two members have identical work-
ing names. Examples of actors, writers, and producers who added a solitary middle initial to avoid
name clashes include Richard E. Grant [31], Michael J. Fox [23], X. J. Kennedy [15], David
O. Selznick [4], and Harrison J. Ford (as the future Indiana Jones actor was billed until 1970)
[II]. Other creative professionals freely choose to add a dummy initial to give themselves a less
ordinary-sounding name: F. Murray Abraham [10, 30], Tom T. Hall [17], and Robert Q. Lewis [8] ,
for instance.
Some single-letter stage names and pseudonyms replace rather than augment a birth name. Notable
examples include actress K Callan (nee Katherine Borman), TV presenter Andrew G (born Andrew
GUnsberg), and writer O. Henry (pen name of William Sydney Porter). A particularly dedicated
minority take this to the extreme, such as musicians -M- (Matthieu Chedid), K (Krishna Kumar),
K (Kang Yoon-Sung), and V (V lad Radovanov), and writer Q (Arthur Quiller-Couch).

The entries below are not meant to be an exhaustive list of short adopted names, but rather a
selection of some particularly famous or interesting cases, many of which don ' t quite fit into the
categories described above.
A Comics publisher Harry "A" Chesler, Jr. adopted a fictitious middle initial while working at
the Philadelphia Public Ledger [13]. He styled it in quotation marks, and sometimes joked
that it stood for "anything" [5] . By some accounts the "Jr." is also bogus.

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 L. A . Law and soap opera star A Martinez was born Adolfo Larrue Martinez III, but from
an early age his famil y referred to him as simply "N' to distingui sh him from hi s father and
grandfather [7].
B Mathematician Benoit B. Mandelbrot, famous for his work in fractal geometry, adopted the
middle initial "B", which he claimed didn't represent any particular name [1 6, 22]. His admir-
ers, however, prefer to think that it stands for "Benoit B. Mandelbrot", lending his name the
same infinitely recursive quality as the fractal set he discovered [33].
J Japanese writer Chiaki J. Konaka's name is unusual as middle names are never used in Japan .
Konaka uses the intrusive "J" only when wri ting the romanized form of his name; it appears to
be an affectation [42].
R Disgraced Illinois governor Rod R. Blagojevich doesn't have a full middle name [14]; accord-
ing to some blogs he adopted the initial "R" in memory of his late father.
S Ulysses S. Grant, 18th president of the United States, was actually born Hiram Ulysses Grant.
The "s" was a clerical error made during his application to West Point, and remained unfixed
despite his protests. He eventually gave in and adopted the initial as his middle name, claiming
it did not actually stand for anything [37].
T Tough guy Mr. T , born Laurence Tureaud, says he changed his name "because I got tired of
people calling me 'boy.' Now the first word out of anybody's mouth has to be mister." [20] In
an episode of the sitcom Silver Spoons he explained his name as follows: "First name: Mister.
Middle name: period. Last name: T." [35]
Doctor Who writer Russell T Davies reluctantly added a spurious "T" (sans period) to his name
to distinguish himself from a BBC presenter of the same name. According to Davies, "I always
make stories up about what the T stands for. Like 'The' or 'Tussle'. That's my favourite one:
Russell Tussle Davies. Though I actually hate the T. It always looks strange to me." [28]
X Futllrama writer David X. Cohen, born David Samuel Cohen, explained hi s middle initi al in
a Reddit post: "'X' is a phony middle initial I made up because my real middle initial, 'S' ,
was already taken by another member of the Writers Guild ... I decided that once I was going
phony, I would take the phoniest letter of all . It turned out to be a good move because it's
easy to remember and debatably 'cool'." [6] Cohen always follows the initial with a period "so
people don't think it' s some mathematical formula: 'David times Cohen' or something" [34].
Activist Malcolm Little changed his name to Malcolm X in 1950. As he wrote in hi s autobiog-
raphy, "For me, my 'X' replaced the white slavemaster name of 'Little' which some blue-eyed
devil named Little had imposed upon my paternal forebears." [45]
8 Journalist Jennifer 8. Lee adopted the unusual middle name "8" to distinguish herself from
the ten thousand other Jennifer Lees in the United States. In 1996 Lee penned an article in The
Boston Globe explaining in detail the history and numerology of her numerical moniker [2 1].

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Spurious or unsubstantiated claims

J Former University of California quarterback J Torchio was commonly believed to have a

single-letter first name, as he insisted it was properly spelled without a period [9]. However, in
high school he was known as "Jay Torchio", and during his time with the San Antonio Gun-
slingers he was billed as "J. L. Torchio" (with periods after the initials) [3, 27]. Today his
Facebook and LinkedIn profiles list his first name as "Jay".
K It's sometimes reported that Harry Potter author Joanne Rowling, better known by her pen
name J. K. Rowling, has a dummy initial, though this assumption seems to be unfounded.
Rowling was not given a middle name at binh; her books are credited to "J. K." rather than
"Joanne" to make them more appealing to boys who would otherwise avoid works by female
authors [32]. However, Rawling later clarified that she had adopted the middle name "Kath-
leen", and has since used the full form "Joanne Kathleen Rowling" in official contexts [44].
L Comedian George L. Gobel often joked that his "L" didn't stand for anything: "It's just so
that I can have G.L.G. embroidered on my shirts so that at the laundry my stuff doesn't get
mixed up with Greta Garbo's stuff." [36] However, most reference works list his middle name
as "Leslie".
T It is a widely repeated claim that that Booker T. & the M.G.'s frontm an Booker T. Jones, unlike
his namesake Booker T. Washington, has no full middle name. However, I have been unable to
substantiate this.
U It is a common misconception that the initial "u" in Burmese names such as UN Secretary
General's U Thant and Burmese Prime Minister's U Nu is a surname. In fact, the Burmese
people do not customarily use surnames; in such contexts the "u" is simply a male honorific
akin to the English "Mr." [26]. (There are a few Burmese given names transliterated as "U",
some of which were covered elsewhere in this article.) However, when one drops the hon-
orific, Prime Minister Nu's name may well be the shortest full birth name (when rendered into
English) of any famous personage in the modern era. His contemporary, the aforementioned
President Ba U, had the second-shortest. Thus, between 13 March 1952 and 12 June 1956,
Burma had the singular distinction of having a head of state and head of government whose
names could be spelled in English with a combined total of just five letters.

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