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Dortha

Girls' name

Variant of Dorothy

Dortha has been given to 6,811 babies in the U.S. since 1889. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1921, with 295 recorded.

Babies named Dortha, 1984

1 in 698,000

Dortha over time, 1880–2025

Girls
010020030018801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Dortha: meaning, origin, and history

Variant of Dorothy

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Dortha means

Dortha is a variant of Dorothy.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Dortha is used in English.

Another recorded pronunciation is /ˈdɔɹ.θə/ and /ˈdɔː.θə/ for Dortha.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Dorothy.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 6,811 girls were recorded with the name Dortha between 1889 and 1984. Its highest annual count was 295 in 1921; its best national rank was #390 in 1921.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

How common is Dortha?

Dortha had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 1984, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 1984
1 in 698,000
5 of 3,488,451 births
Among girls only
1 in 337,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 1984
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
483,603 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Dortha sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Olivia (13,544)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 1984 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 483,603 children born in 1984 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Dortha. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Dorthas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Dortha was born before 1926 — so the typical Dortha is around 99 today.

Median birth year
1926
About 99 years old
Biggest decade
1920s
36.7% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
3.0%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
531
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1920s — 36.7% of all recorded uses (2,500).

Is Dortha rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
New entry
Not ranked then
Rank vs 10 years ago
—
Not ranked then
Births vs 10 years ago
—
Not published both years
Share of its own peak
0%
Peak was 1921 (295)
Years since peak
104
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
32.0% average annual change
Best rank ever
#390
1921

Spellings of Dortha

Dortha is not the most common spelling — Dorothy is, with 52.8% against Dortha's 0.32%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Where Dortha is used

Across 1910–2025, Dortha was most concentrated in Oklahoma — about 1 in 2,941 girls, against 1 in 22,110 across all states with data. It was least common in Virginia (1 in —).

034 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Oklahoma1 in 2,941
  2. 2Arkansas1 in 3,333
  3. 3West Virginia1 in 3,846
  4. 4Kentucky1 in 6,250
  5. 5Missouri1 in 9,091
  6. 6Tennessee1 in 9,091
  7. 7Mississippi1 in 12,500
  8. 8Indiana1 in 14,286

Shading is the share of that state's recorded girls given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Dortha has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Dortha by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#390
1921
Peak year
1921
295 that year
First recorded
1889
Last recorded
1984
All-time count
6,811
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Dortha

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

DorethaDorothaDorcasDorianDoreathaDorthyDorrisDoreneAgathaDortheaDoriDoreenDorinaDorineDorindaDoriaAlethaDorathaLeathaTalithaArethaDorettaTabathaDorothea

Names with a curve like Dortha

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Dortha, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

DorrisJaunitaMarjorySybleAlleneVerlaFloreneGeneJohnieImaAleneMyrtis

Sibling names for Dortha

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Dortha

Top names of 1921, Dortha's peak yearThe 1920s in fullOther names that peaked in 1921Girls' names starting with D