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[Facts] Diamond - usage ?
I just saw this
http://www.behindthename.com/top/name/diamond
Diamond was top 200 in the 90s?! I never saw it. I still haven't seen anyone named it. Was it used only by a certain demographic? Was the usage inspired by a famous person or event?- mirfak
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Lou Diamond Phillips...?

This message was edited 8/11/2014, 4:29 PM

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Probably not: Lou Diamond Phillips is a man (I had to look that up, its is not clear from the name!), but the name was popular for girls, not for boys.
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Diamond was the name of a gladiator in the TV show "American Gladiators" from 1990--93. Maybe this explains the peak in the 1990ies, but the name started raising in numbers before that date. "Something" happened in the early seventies (Neil Diamond? -- at that time there were more male diamonds than female ones), and again "something" happened around 1981/82 (don't know what).
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Diamond was a name used primarily in the African-American community. So far the only possible event that might have inspired this I've been able to come up with is the release of Sade's first album, titled "Diamond Life", in 1985, the year before Diamond first made the top 1000 SSA list. However, since that was just the name of the album and there wasn't an individual song with that title this is still just a guess. It's often harder to figure out where the popularity of a name which is also a common word comes from.
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I knew a few Diamond's in the 90's, all infants, mostly of Hispanic or African American background. I don't know why it was popular, but every gemstone has its day as a name.
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