Mother Searching Cemeteries for Baby Names Goes Viral

Credit: Schlitzberegers & Daughters Monument Co.

Numerous experts and influencers on the internet offer advice on how to choose a name for a baby. But you’d be hard-pressed to find one suggesting the novel method selected by Haley Hodge: cruise a cemetery, and not just any cemetery.

To find the perfect name, Hodge explored a proper Southern gothic-style graveyard with weathered tombstones bearing names of the deceased, which is where she gets her inspiration.

Hodge shared this novel method of name selection in a TikTok video posted on May 19. The video shows the very pregnant 30-year-old Hodge casually wandering through a cemetery near her North Carolina home, accompanied by two of her three children, who are eagerly participating in the search for a name.

Text on the opening scene declares that when cemeteries hold the prettiest names “you take the family to look for baby girl’s name.”

As she walks by the tombstones, some dating back to 1792, she calls out the names; more than a few are unusual and pretty, with many viewers singling out Salem and Vienna in the comments.

Within three days her post attracted 2.3 million views. Hodge, who is a physical therapist, told Newsweek that she had anticipated a robust reaction to her video, “solely because I know it’s weird.”

But for her, she explained, a cemetery is a perfectly normal place to hang out. Hodge’s history-buff mother had frequently taken her children to graveyards as a way to teach them about the past. And while her mother would follow up a history lesson with the spooky stories she personally enjoyed, Hodge came to think of cemeteries as “more of a library, full of stories rather than a scary place.”

Not everyone who has commented on the video shares her comfort level, however. Said one viewer, “I’ve heard that pregnancies attract ghosts. I feel like this is picking up a ghost at the rescue shelter!”

More often, though, the comments were positive, like this one: “Carrying a brand-new soul through a garden of the past. What a clever way to find a beautiful name.”

And it also struck a chord with viewers who had lost children, like this one: “Love this. I hope people walk by my child and say her name. I can’t stop crying … oh goodness I hope so.”

And of course, some saw it as a joke: “How did you pick my name, mom? We searched thru an old cemetery.” But that’s exactly how Hodge’s mother chose Cooper as her sister’s name.

As Hodge put it, she sees each marker representing someone’s entire life, “not just a body.” And that’s a lesson she wants to share with her children. They have the option to skip her cemetery visits, but they come because they like being outdoors and reading the names and dates, she said.

And she’s not alone in her view of cemeteries as a source of life lessons, particularly for children.

On its website for Associated Catholic Cemeteries, the Archdiocese of Seattle states that “Cemeteries are not just about death … They remind us of the inevitability of life’s cycle, encouraging conversations about life and death within families. These discussions can help children develop a healthy perspective on mortality and can also lead to deeper conversations about the­­ values and legacy that family members want to leave behind.”

Hodge sees her family graveyard visits as a way to share her spiritual beliefs with her children. “In my opinion, death is not the end, so I don’t want to teach them that it’s all scary. It’s the beginning of a new adventure that I like to believe is heaven.”