The "And...How About The Middle Name!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  I was trying to remember how many of my friends didn't have a middle name.  Thought for quite some time and couldn't find a single one who didn't have a middle name.  Now, if you read my blog from time to time, you probably remember a story or two when I told you about all the trouble I have gotten into due to someone whose name is the same as mine, Larry W. Woods.  Its been more than once that the people in authority (police) have called my wife asking about one Larry W. Woods.  By now she knows how to handle the situation, since the other Larry W. Woods has a different middle name than I do.  What did people do years and years ago when people didn't have a middle name or middle initial.  The traditional middle name goes all the back to close to 3,000 years ago in Rome.  In Rome it wasn't uncommon for Roman men to sport three names known as the praenomen, nomen and cognomen.  The praenomen was the individual's personal name, such as Larry, whereas the nomen was the family name, such as Woods.  The cognomen was slightly different and was more of a nickname that was passed down from father to son.  This is different than how we use the three names today being that we use the nomen, or family name, as the last part of our name.  Using a middle name probably became a normal practice in the 13th center when the elite in Italy began using it.  By the 14th century, use of a longer name became popular across all social classes and made its way to the countryside, where it became even more prevalent.  Parents had to decide if they should use the name of a saint for their newborn or if they show bear the family name.  The former was thought to provide their child with protection in life.  So, they began to use both.  

Using a middle name began to spread.  Italy, Spain and France used middle names as well as England's upper class.  By the start of the 19th century, Europe was full of citizens with three names and colonists in the United States were doing the same.  Today it isn't unusual for us to use all three names from time to time.  We known William Brad Pitt as Brad Pitt; we known John William Ferrell as Will Farrell.  Your middle name is a portion of you personal name that is written between your given name and your surname.  Some keep it as a name while others prefer an initial.  I prefer an initial unless my wife happens to be talking to the police, then I prefer my middle name of William.  But, what do we do when the woman gets married and has a maiden name?  Does she now have four names?  My wife decided to drop her third name of Baker and take my name of Woods so she still retains three names, with her middle initial still being "A" for Ann.  I have a friend who I worked with who went by R. Dean Lemon.  Boy did that screw things up!  Seems he didn't like his given name of Ruel so he chose to be known as Dean.  Same goes for the Principal of the school where we both taught.  The principal's name was C. Wendell Hower.  I never called him anything except Mr. Hower, so I have no idea what the C. stands for anyway.  And, for my wife and I, I may have to be known as Larry William Woods in order to keep the police away from the house.  Seems Larry Wayne Woods enjoys using just his middle initial, since it takes the police away from him for some time until my wife can explain to then that they are looking in the wrong place for their man.  She's getting real good at doing that.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.