Tennie
A feminine diminutive of Tenna, meaning "little Tenna" in English.
Name Census estimates that about 390 living Americans carry the first name Tennie. It is a predominantly female name (99.3% of registrations). The average person named Tennie today is around 72 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Tennie births was 1918 (79 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Tennie. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
Key insights
- • The typical person named Tennie is about 72 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Tennies were born before 1964.
People living today
390
~ 1 in 878,857 Americans
Peak year
1918
79 babies that year
Average age
72
years old
1923 SSA rank
#4,191
Tracked since 1880
Census
Tennie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 590 people with the first name Tennie, which placed it at #18,296 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#18,296
National first-name rank
People counted
590
590 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.4% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Tennie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Tennie is White at 65.4%. The next largest groups are Black (24.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (3.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Tennie described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Tennie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.4% · 386
- Black or African American24.6% · 145
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.7% · 22
- Two or more races3.6% · 21
- Hispanic or Latino1.9% · 11
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.8% · 5
Gender
Gender distribution for Tennie
Out of the 2,796 babies given the name Tennie since 1880, 99.3% were registered as female. The name sits firmly on the female side of the spectrum, with only a handful of male registrations across the entire dataset.
Tennie as a male name
- Ranked #4,191 in 1923
- 6 male births in 1923
- Peak: 1914 (7 births)
Tennie as a female name
- Ranked #11,671 in 1988
- 6 female births in 1988
- Peak: 1918 (73 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Tennie leans strongly female. 552 people counted with this name were female (93.2%), compared with 40 male bearers (6.8%).
Popularity
Tennie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Tennie from the 1880s through to the 1980s, spanning 11 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1910s, with 519 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1910s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Tennie by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Tennie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Tennies live
The SSA's state-level files cover 10 states and territories. Tennessee, Texas, Arkansas recorded the most babies named Tennie, while West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 72 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Tennie
The name Tennie is believed to have its origins in the English language, likely emerging during the late 19th or early 20th century. It is thought to be a diminutive form or nickname derived from the name Etienne, which itself is the French form of the Greek name Stephanos, meaning "crown" or "wreath."
While the name Tennie does not appear to have any direct historical references in ancient texts or religious scriptures, its connection to the name Etienne/Stephanos suggests a potential link to early Christian figures bearing that name, such as St. Stephen, the first Christian martyr mentioned in the New Testament.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Tennie can be found in the United States, where a woman named Tennie Hinton was born in North Carolina in 1886. Another early bearer of the name was Tennie M. Sharp, born in Kentucky in 1888.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Tennie. One such person was Tennie Rogers Meadors (1888-1986), an American educator and school administrator from Texas. Another was Tennie Verbo (1912-1998), a Canadian politician who served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba.
Tennie Dawkins (1914-1984) was an American country blues singer and guitarist from Mississippi, known for her work with the Mississippi Sheiks in the 1930s. Tennie Elizabeth Claflin (1871-1950), better known as Tennessee Celeste Claflin, was an American actress and vaudeville performer active in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Finally, Tennie Pauline McWilliams (1884-1966) was an American artist and painter from Texas, known for her works depicting scenes of rural life in the American Southwest.
People
Tennie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Tennie as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with T
Other first names starting with T with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Tennie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Tennie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 390 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Tennie going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 878,857 US residents.
Is Tennie a common name?
We classify Tennie as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82.1% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,796 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Tennie most popular?
The single biggest year for Tennie was 1918, when 79 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Tennie is about 72 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Tennie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 590 people with the name Tennie, or 0.20 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #18,296 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Tennie in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Tennie?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Tennie leans strongly female. 552 people counted with this name were female (93.2%), compared with 40 male bearers (6.8%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Tennie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Tennie is White at 65.4%. The next largest groups are Black (24.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (3.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Tennie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Tennie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.4% (386 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Tennie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Tennie a female name?
Yes, 99.3% of people registered as Tennie in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Tennie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Tennie in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Tennie can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have the name Tennie?
If you just want to know how many Americans are named Tennie, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.