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Besse

About 671 American babies have been named Besse since 1880, most of them around 1889. It has not appeared in the national data since 1926. About 1 Besses are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 101.

Popularity, 1880–2025

Births per year, 1880 to 2025 0 10 20 30 40 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

girls named Besse

By the numbers

Total US births
671
Estimated living today
1
Median age today
101
Peak year
1889
Best rank
388th
Rank in 2025
unranked
First recorded
1880

How old the living Besses are

Born with the name each year, and how many of them are alive today, 1880 to 2025 0 4 8 12 16 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

born that year still alive today

Of the 671 babies given the name since 1880, about 1 are alive — 0 in every hundred. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 1924 and half after.

An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.

Names of 1889

The most popular girls’ names the year Besse peaked:

All the names of 1889

Related names

Besse against another name

Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.

Compare Besse with a name of your own

Try it on yourself

Source: US Social Security Administration, national and state baby-name files, 1880–2025. Counts include only births registered with the SSA, and names with fewer than five births in a year are not published. The living estimate applies SSA cohort life tables to those births; it counts people born in the United States, so it misses anyone who arrived later and anyone who has left.