Larry

A pet form of Laurence, tracing back to the Roman surname Laurentius, meaning an inhabitant of the ancient city of Laurentum. English speakers long used it as an informal domestic diminutive before nineteenth-century parents began logging it directly onto birth certificates. In the United States, it steadily detached from its Latinate parent until it stood entirely on its own.

The name arrives without ceremony. It carries the acoustic profile of a screen door and the cadence of a baseball broadcast on AM radio. With an average bearer age of sixty-six and 57 percent of living holders belonging to the baby boom, it remains firmly anchored to the postwar neighborhood. Only 198 infants received the name in 2025. Today, it sounds less like a playground summons and more like an entry on a committee sign-in sheet.