This week we are continuing with the fun and looking into #GetADifferentNameDay. That`s on February the 13th, and it is primarily a day where we try out a new identity just for fun, though there is a serious side to it as well, as if we do not like our name it is a day which will maybe spur us into getting it changed, forever, legally.
We started the week with our three clue cards and they illustrate the three most likely reasons that people change their names.
First up, and the main reason, is that you change your name when you get married. So our first clue card, of Saturday the 7th of February showed Morgan Brian, who, on her marriage in 2017, became Morgan Gautrat. However cards of her were a bit slow to follow suit, and the first one to feature her under her married name was Parkside`s "NWSL Premier Edition" in 2021. Not all women change their name on their wedding, especially if they are well known by their maiden name and think it may dent their popularity. Legally, women have had to assume their husband's surname since the 9th century, but it was hit and miss in rural areas, and only really became enforced in the sixteenth century. Though actually it is no longer the law that you have to change your surname on marriage, only your prefix, of Miss, to either Ms. or Mrs.
Secondly, many film actors and actresses change their name when they start their career because they think their original is hard to pronounce, or impossible to remember. So our second clue card, for Sunday the 8th of February, shows us Emilie Chauchoin, who used her middle name, of Claudette , for her pseudonynmous forename, and her paternal grandmother`s maiden name, of Colbert, for her surname This was a very early decision on her part, before she ever appeared in her first film "For the Love of Mike", released in 1927, for on the posters for that she is already billed as Claudette Colbert.
Thirdly, not just actors and actresses change their name when they start their career, musicians do too, and they often take a name that is completely made up, sometimes even for shock value. However quite a lot of them seem to like a single name, rather than two. That brings us to our third clue card, for .Monday the 9th of February which shows a lady who did just that, and whom we know as Cher. In fact she has changed her name many times since she thought she was christened Cherilyn Sarkisian (though that was an error, the birth certificate was entered as Cheryl, but she only found out in 1979. In 1961 she was formally adopted by her stepfather and changed her surname to LaPiere. Then, in 1969, she married Sonny Bono .They divorced in 1975 and the same year she married another musician Gregg Allman. They were divorced in 1979, after which she legally shortened her forename to Cher, the name she had been using professionally since the 1960s, and decided to abandon any surname.
On which note, if anyone else would like to send us any information from their collection which relates in any way to our theme of the week, please do.The e-mail is webmaster@card-world.co.uk - and this is the same for any corrections, or for general cartophilic correspondence and chat.