Waldon
Masculine · “wooded hill”
Waldon is a letter away from an English place name and a letter away from a Germanic first name, and nothing in the record chooses. The place name's most famous American bearer is a pond, and the book written beside it contains one of the most quoted household accounts in literature.
How old is the name Waldon?
Waldon first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Waldon alive today was born around 1931, making them about 94 years old. About 200 people named Waldon are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Waldon most popular?
Waldon peaked in 1922, reaching #1333 nationally. See the whole 1922 chart.
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
The story of Waldon
Thoreau built a cabin by a pond outside Concord and lived in it for two years, and the first chapter of the book he made out of it includes a table of what the building cost him. Boards, second-hand windows, a thousand bricks, two casks of lime, hair, mantle-tree iron, nails, hinges and screws, latch, chalk, transportation — the total comes to twenty-eight dollars and twelve and a half cents, and he prints it as an itemised list because his argument is that shelter is cheap and most people spend their lives paying for more of it than they need. The book has been read as a wilderness memoir ever since, which annoys people who point out that the pond was a walk from town, that he took his laundry home, and that he had dinner with his family regularly. He never claimed otherwise; the experiment was about arithmetic, not isolation.
Meaning
wooded hill
An English place name joining the word for woodland to the word for a hill, of a kind that produced dozens of surnames. Read instead as a build on the Germanic Waldo, it means something about ruling. The record does not say which any given family meant.
Pronouncing Waldon
WAWL-dun
Two syllables with the stress at the front. The second syllable is unstressed and therefore free, which is why it can be written with an e, an o or an a and sound the same.
Nicknames for Waldon
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1912
- Most boys named
- 192230 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1333reached in 1922
- Change vs 2021
- −28.6%5 in 2024, from 7
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Waldons among us
people named Waldon are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Waldon sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- Two syllables with front stress is the plainest shape English has.
- Don detaches as a short form and needs no explanation anywhere.
- Every letter behaves as English expects.
- Walden and Waldron will both be written for it.
- The unstressed second syllable means the spelling has to be given every time.
- Which of the two possible origins applies is not recorded.
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Waldon
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Waldons are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 200 people named Waldon are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Waldon in 2025?
- Waldon is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Waldon with classmates?
- Waldon will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More W names
The most-given names starting with W, all years combined.
William#9 · Walter#251 · Willie#1315 · Wayne#652 · Wesley#52 · Wyatt#38 · Warren#240 · Wallace#960
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Waldon? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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