Just Joshin'

There used to be annual meetings of the Jim Smith Society where they packed an auditorium or convention hall with people christened by that name, which is also a very popular name on motel registers across America. We had a Jim Smith who was our county executive and a circuit court judge here in Baltimore County, and a weatherman by that name at Channel 13 a long time before radar. 

And back in the 1950s, when that Jim Smith was saying he guessed it might rain sometime, there were very few guys named Josh.

 And that has changed. The name "Josh" or "Joshua" peaked in popularity as a baby name in 1986, as the chart shows, so all those Joshes are running around now having a lot of fun like this...

Hundreds of Joshes went to Lincoln, Nebraska, in April, fighting for the right to be called The El Supremo Josh. They fought it out with pool noodles as their friends and wanna-be-Joshes stood cheering.

Perhaps they could have called it The Day Of A Million Joshes.

At the end, King Josh was crowned, in the form of 4-year-old Lincoln resident Josh Vinson, Jr., who is known as "Little Josh" among friends and family. 

Josh Swain, 22, is a college student in Arizona, and last year, in the throes of what he called  "a spell of pandemic boredom," he set out to contact as many Josh Swains as he could find on Facebook.

A lot of people do this. Dozens of people happen to share my name, and wouldn't you know it, most of them are deep in debt and facing dissolute futures. But young Swain added some spice: all the name-doppelgangers were invited to meet up to duke it out, with the prize being the right to be The One And Only Josh Swain.

"We fight, whoever wins gets to keep the name," he said. "Everyone else has to change their name, you have a year to prepare, good luck."

He says it was all a joke at first, but as has happened so often in a nation full of people staring at their screens, the internet went berserk, and soon enough, Swain was headed for Lincoln (the location was chosen by jotting down two geographical coordinates at random) to "defend his name."

Swain also turned the gathering into a food drive for those in need and welcomed ALL Joshes, not only those with the surname Swain. There was one more Josh Swain, who came from Omaha to meet with the Arizona version, who won a fiercely-contested rock-paper-scissors battle to back his claim of Josh Swain-ness.

After that came the battle royale of all Joshes with pool noodles, live streamed across the globe. You won't be surprised to find that many of the participants dressed as Superheroes for the noodle fight.

Do you get the idea that a lot of people drive around with Superhero costumes in their trunk "just in case"?

And there was a great outcome. The event raised more than $10,000 for the Children's Hospital and Medical Center Foundation, where children across Nebraska find medical services just for them.

And THE Josh Swain thanked all participants, calling the whole deal "incredibly respectful, polite, joyful, and just awesome overall."

And there's talk of having a similar event next year. Calling all Jenny Smiths!