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Wenonah

Girls' name

Variant of Winona

Wenonah has been given to 506 babies in the U.S. since 1903. 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 1916, with 26 recorded.

Babies named Wenonah, 2017

1 in 596,000

Wenonah over time, 1880–2025

Girls
010203018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Wenonah: meaning, origin, and history

Variant of Winona

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Wenonah means

Wenonah is a variant of Winona.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Wenonah is used in Literature.

Another recorded pronunciation is /wə.ˈnoʊ.nə/ for Wenonah.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Wenonah → Winona. The family’s meaning is “firstborn daughter”, recorded in English with the source elements winúŋna.

Origin, language, and formation

Wenonah is used in English.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Winona.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 506 girls were recorded with the name Wenonah between 1903 and 2017. Its highest annual count was 26 in 1916; its best national rank was #1,484 in 1916.

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.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Wenonah?

Wenonah had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2017, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2017
1 in 596,000
6 of 3,577,106 births
Among girls only
1 in 288,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2017
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
413,245 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Wenonah 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 2017 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 413,245 children born in 2017 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Wenonah. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Wenonahs were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Wenonah was born before 1928 — so the typical Wenonah is around 97 today.

Median birth year
1928
About 97 years old
Biggest decade
1910s
26.9% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
1.2%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
154
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1910s — 26.9% of all recorded uses (136).

Is Wenonah 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 1916 (26)
Years since peak
109
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
29.5% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,484
1916

Spellings of Wenonah

Wenonah is not the most common spelling — Winona is, with 60.0% against Wenonah's 2.3%.

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 Wenonah is used

Across 1910–2025, Wenonah was most concentrated in California — about 1 in — girls, against 1 in 2,357,808 across all states with data. It was least common in Texas (1 in —).

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1California1 in —
  2. 2Texas1 in —

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. Wenonah has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Wenonah around the world

Where Wenonah ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • South Australia
    1996–1996
    #712
    in 1996

Popularity data from Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Wenonah 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
#1,484
1916
Peak year
1916
26 that year
First recorded
1903
Last recorded
2017
All-time count
506
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Wenonah

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

AlainahAaminahWendellAleenahGiannahKiannahAiyanahWendolynAyannahElianahAlonnahLeannahAllanahArianahAvianahMadinahAmeenahSakinahAlaynahAyanahIyanahDannahRainahWendelyn

Sibling names for Wenonah

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 Wenonah

Top names of 1916, Wenonah's peak yearThe 1910s in fullOther names that peaked in 1916Girls' names starting with W