Children of the Presidents of the United States, 1885-2014

Anna Clarkson
I chose to look at the names of the children of the presidents throughout history. I narrowed it down to kids who
were known, which in this case meant they lived in the White House while their father was president (or spent
significant time there). The earliest president the dataset would allow me to look at was Grover Cleveland, who was
president from 1885-1889 and 1893-1897. The most recent president I looked at was Barack Obama, who was
president from 2009-2017. A selection of the results are below.

Using R, the dataset was filtered first by name, then by year and sex (for all names except Malia, which had no
males). The data was then grouped together and plotted. For some of the visualizations, the exact years could not
be used when coding the annotations due to the placement of the lines. The visualizations display the popularity of
the names for the five years before their father was elected to five years after (or, in the Obama's case, as far
forward as the dataset goes).

Malia and Sasha Obama

For this visualization, I looked at the frequency of the names of Barack

Obamas children, Malia and Sasha. The names were fairly non-existent
prior to 2007-2008, when Barack Obama became known nationally,
eventually winning the 2008 presidential election. This is one of the most
dramatic examples of how presidential kids impact names across the
country. Both their names peaked in 2009, the year their father was
inaugurated. Before the election, Sashas name was more popular,
however, Malias took over in late 2007 and has remained the more
popular name since. In 2004, 681 girls were named Malia; 5 years later,
in 2009, 1,699 girls were named Malia. Sasha was a more popular name
before the election, with 849 girls in 2004; however, as mentioned
above, it didnt reach the same levels as Malia1,248 girls were named
Sasha in 2009. Over 1,000 girls were named Malia from 2009-2011,
while only in 2009 were more than 1,000 girls named Sasha. Top: Family portrait, 2009,
Bottom: White House State Dinner, 2016

> SashaMalia <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "F", name %in% c("Sasha", "Malia"))
> subset(SashaMalia, year %in% 2004:2014) -> SashaMaliaLate

> Obamas <- ggplot(SashaMaliaLate, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) + geom_line()
> Obamas + annotate("text", x = 2009, y = .00085, label = "Obama became president")
 The result:

Jenna Bush

The next visualization looks at Jenna, one of the daughters of George W.

Bush, president from 2001-2009. There is a clear spike in 2001, which
could be attributed both to her father becoming president, as well as the
occurrence of the September 11 terrorist attacks. Due to the inauguration
and 9/11 being only eight months apart, it is impossible to tell which event
had a greater impact. From then on, the name has a steady decline, with a
plateau around 2007. The popularity of Jenna continued to decline past the
time her father left office in 2009. The decline is interesting, seeing as
Jenna is not an uncommon name. The name of her twin sister, Barbara, was
not as popular (this was also the name of their grandmother, the former
First Lady, which is why it is excluded). This is similar to Bushs approval
rating, which following 9/11 (and the resounding "rally-round-the-flag"
response), saw an almost 40% jump to 90% (the highest of any presidents
approval ever recorded by Gallup). However, this was short-lived, and his
approval began to drop shortly after, and by the time Obama was elected,
his approval rating was his all-time low, at 25%the 3rd lowest of any
president. Jenna (along with her twin sister) also had her fair share of
bumpsthey were arrested twice while at the University of Texas for
underage drinking, and had a habit of evading their Secret Service details. Top: An inaugural ball, 2001
Bottom: Jennas wedding, 2008
 > Jenna <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "F", name %in% c("Jenna"))
> subset(Jenna, year %in% 1996:2014) -> JennaLate

> BushJenna <- ggplot(JennaLate, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) + geom_line()
> BushJenna + annotate("text", x = 1998.7, y = .0029, label = "Bush became president") + annotate("text", x = 2001.6, y = .00285, label = "9/11") + annotate("text", x = 2009, y =
.0011, label = "Bush left office")

The result:

Chelsea Clinton

This visualization looks at the daughter of President Bill Clinton, Chelsea.

Clinton was inaugurated in 1993 and served until 2001. She was 13 when
she moved into the White House with her parents, and stayed there until she
went to Stanford in 1997. Her parents made a point to keep her out of the
public sphere, a feat that was easier in the 1990s than it is today. Still, she
received more press coverage than many of the previous presidential
children. Chelsea later received a masters degree from the University of
Oxford, as well as a M.P.H. from Columbia University. The popularity of the
name Chelsea peaked around the time Clinton was elected and inaugurated,
and then started a decline that continued at least until Clinton left office,
although it started to plateau in the early 2000s. This is in contrast to her
fathers approval rating; he is the lone president (since approval ratings
have been tracked) to leave office with a higher approval rating than he
came in with. Chelsea has since come back into the public sphere, playing
an active role (along with her father) in helping her mother campaign for the
2016 presidential election, particularly when it came to fundraising. She
has also written children's books with her mother. She also has a major
Top: Inauguration, 1993
role in the family's Clinton Foundation, with a seat on the board.
Bottom: Hillarys US Senate oath, 2001
 >Chelsea <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "F", name %in% c("Chelsea"))
> subset(Chelsea, year %in% 1988:2006) -> ChelseaLate

> Clinton <- ggplot(ChelseaLate, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) + geom_line()
> Clinton + annotate("text", x = 1992, y = .0083, label = "Clinton became president") + annotate("text", x = 2000, y = .0015, label = "Clinton left office")

The result:

Caroline and Patrick Kennedy

This visualization looks at two of the three Kennedy children, Caroline and
Patrick. John F. Kennedy became president in January 1961, following his
victory in November 1960. Patrick, the younger of the two displayed, was
born prematurely in August 1963 and died at two days old. His father, John F.
Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, just three months later in
November 1963. There is a visible spike in the appearance of the name
Patrick following both his fathers assassination and his birth and death,
presumably to honor both of them. There is also a rise in the popularity of
Caroline following her father's assassination, although it is not nearly as
pronounced as Patrick. It appears Patrick was a much more common name at
the time than Caroline, his older sister (and only living child of JFK and Jackie;
middle brother John, known as John-John as a child, was killed in a plane
crash in 1999). I chose to exclude John because it was the name of the
president as well, which skewed the data; the same thing happened with the
Roosevelts, who named their first son Theodore. However, five years after
their father was assassinated, both names remained more popular than they
were five years prior to his presidency. To get both names on the plot, I used
Top: JFK with Caroline, 1960
the merge function, allowing me to combine two names of opposite genders. Bottom: 1963
 > Caroline <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "F", name %in% c("Caroline"))
> subset(Caroline, year %in% 1955:1968) -> CarolineLate

> Patrick <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "M", name %in% c("Patrick"))
> Patrick <- Patrick %>% arrange(prop)
> subset(Patrick, year %in% 1955:1968) -> PatrickLate

> CarolinePatrick <- merge(CarolineLate, PatrickLate, all=T)

> ggplot(CarolinePatrick, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) -> CarolPatMerge
> CarolPatAnnotate <- ggplot(CarolinePatrick, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) + geom_line()
> CarolPatAnnotate + annotate("text", x = 1961, y = 0.0012, label = "JFK became president") + annotate("text", x = 1964.7, y = 0.0065, label = "Patrick's birth & death") +
annotate("text", x = 1963, y = 0.0073, label = "JFK assassinated")

The result:
 Calvin Coolidge, Jr.

This visualization is of Calvin Coolidge, Jr., the son of President

Calvin Coolidge, who was in office from 1923-1929, following
Warren Hardings unexpected death (he was later elected in
1924). Calvin was 15 at the time. Unfortunately, he passed away
the following year from blood poisoning. The combination of his
young death and his father being the new president are the likely
reasons for the dramatic spike in the popularity of the name
Calvin around 1924. However, the names popularity was short-
lived, and it started to decline immediately, not seeing another
uptick until the 1930s. Coolidge had another son, John, who never
lived in the White House (he attended boarding school), and
therefore was not included in this data. Coolidge chose not to run
for re-election in 1928, and many attribute this to the death of
The Coolidge family at the White House in 1924; Calvin Jr. is next to
Calvin Jr. He noted in his autobiography that, When [Calvin]
his father
went, the power and the glory of the Presidency went with him.
Coolidge died less than four years after leaving office.

> Calvin <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "M", name %in% c("Calvin"))
> subset(Calvin, year %in% 1918:1934) -> CalvinLate

> CoolidgeAnnotate <- ggplot(CalvinLate, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) + geom_line()
> CoolidgeAnnotate + annotate("text", x = 1924, y = .0043, label = "Calvin (Jr.)'s death") + annotate("text", x = 1929, y = .002, label = "Coolidge left office") + annotate("text", x =
1921.5, y = .003, label = "Coolidge became president")

The result:
 Roosevelt Children

The final visualization is for Teddy Roosevelts male children.

Roosevelt was president from 1901 until 1909. He had a
daughter named Ethel, whose name was much more popular,
therefore skewing the distribution when it was included. That
graph can be seen here. Despite Roosevelts son Ted sharing
his name, it was not the most popular of the siblings. That
was Archie, which was considerably more popular than any of
the others. Another surprising finding was that Kermit was
not the most popular name, despite it being the most
unusual. The least popular of the names was Quentin, which
never garnered much popularity, despite his fathers
prominence. It is interesting to note that Quentin and Kermit
did not appear in the database, which counts names with over
5 representations, until 1900. Quentin was born in 1897, and
Kermit in 1889. Roosevelt family in Oyster Bay, New York, 1907. L-R: Kermit, Archie,
President Theodore Roosevelt, First Lady Ethel Roosevelt, Edith, Ted, and
Quentin

> RooseveltsM <- babynames %>% filter (sex == "M", name %in% c("Ted", "Kermit", "Archie", "Quentin"))
> subset(RooseveltsM, year %in% 1896:1914) -> RooseveltsMLate

> RooseveltMerge <- merge(RooseveltsMLate, EthelLate, all=T)

> ggplot(RooseveltMerge, aes(x = year, y = prop, color = name)) -> Roosevelts Roosevelts + geom_line()

The result:
 Overall Findings

Overall, it appears that the names of presidential children peak shortly after they are inaugurated, or, as in the case
of JFKs children, when there are major events pertaining personally to the president. After the first year, the names
drop, and continue to do so, in many cases past the time of the president leaving office. It was interesting to see
that in most cases, and all of those seen here, the names were less popular before the presidency as well. This
would be expected with less popular names like Malia or Sasha, but to see it for common names like Jenna or
Chelsea was noteworthy. Going off that, it appears that regardless of the popularity of a name prior to the election
and inauguration, the presidency impacts the popularity of the names of his children. Further research doing a more
in-depth comparison of the name popularity with the president's approval rating would be interesting.