In an interview with Norman Geras, J Bradford DeLong makes the following odd statement:
If you had to change your first name, what would you change it to?
> Brad :)
So in an ideal world, he’d be called Bradford Bradford DeLong? Without wanting to cast aspersions, I have to say that if Prof DeLong had ever been to Bradford, he might not be so keen on having it in his name, twice.
{ 13 comments }
Nasi Lemak 01.16.04 at 6:47 pm
Maybe “Bradford” has that property of negatives such that two Bradfords is the same as none?
laura 01.16.04 at 9:17 pm
I have a friend who at her, what is it, confirmation as a Catholic, where you choose a middle name of one of the saints or something? Anyway, she hadn’t paid attention in the class preparing her for it, so when the priest asked her what her name was, meaning what middle name she had chosen, she told him her first name. Which means that now her name is in some technical sense Lynne Lynne deBenedette.
Karl Marx 01.16.04 at 10:41 pm
He, the young man carbuncular, arrives,
A small house agent’s clerk, with one bold stare,
One of the low on whom assurance sits
As a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire.
That was the natural association for Eliot, anyway – more millionaires per head pre-1914 than anywhere else in the UK.
It is a pretty interesting place you know. All that Germanic architecture (a favourite for shooting films – c.f. Alan Bennett, _Writing Home_ )
bryan 01.16.04 at 11:02 pm
I bet he’s under the mistaken impression that brad is short for bradley.
Henry 01.17.04 at 1:12 am
At the moment, his blog seems to have the title of “Brad DeLong’s Brad DeLong’s Semi-Daily Journal,” adding another layer of iterated nomenclature.
Brad DeLong 01.17.04 at 1:46 am
My name is James Bradford DeLong…
ben wolfson 01.17.04 at 4:14 am
One can be named “Brad” without being named “Bradford”, of course. Obviously he wants to be named Brad Bradford DeLong.
Jeffrey Kramer 01.17.04 at 4:30 am
Novelist Ford Madox Hueffer decided he didn’t like the sound of his name, and changed it to Ford Madox Ford. (DeLong Bradford DeLong… has a ring.)
LaughingWoman 01.17.04 at 2:20 pm
“My name is James Bradford DeLong.”
Well, I’m certainly glad now I know everything about you there is to know! That was the one last thing!
That was the most ridiculous interview I have ever heard! What in the heck were you wearing? OK, don’t tell me. HAHA.
Just saw a really interesting Mideast military souvenir- you might have to go get one. One of the student workers brought back a pair of plastic embedded long-horned beetles from Quatar, I think. On the top it says “Happy Blessings.”
zizka 01.18.04 at 6:18 am
No Butros Butros-Ghali jokes?
There’s also a guy named W.C. Dampier Dampier-Whetham. Does he count?
Mr Ripley 01.18.04 at 7:27 am
Fordie was born Ford Hermann Hueffer. IIRC, he changed the middle name to Madox out of reverence for his ancestor, Ford Madox Brown, and the last name to Ford because he thought that for an English guy to have a German surname during the Great War was, or would be perceived as, unpatriotic.
Mark 01.18.04 at 10:20 pm
While on the topic of economists’ names, does anyone know what the ‘Y’ stands for in the name of financial economist John Y. Campbell?
dsquared 01.19.04 at 6:43 am
I’m hoping it’s Ysidro, after Francis Y Edgeworth.
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