Letha

Most frequently adopted in the American South as a shortened form of Aletha, from the Greek for truth, though occasionally borrowed from the mythological Leda. It entered Social Security rolls in 1880 as part of a broader wave of soft, vowel-heavy two-syllable girls' names. It never cracked the national top two hundred, quietly holding ground on rural birth registries instead.

The name reads as a hand-cranked sewing machine in a sunlit parlor. Modern listeners frequently assume they misheard Lisa or Leta. Living bearers belong mostly to the midcentury generation, with an average age near sixty-eight. It gives the impression of someone who keeps a cedar chest with the original brass key still taped inside the lid.