What’s in a Name? That Which We Call a Home for the Aged, Would it Smell as Sweet?

I am currently working on a project where a proper title for “homes for the aged” is a topic of debate. 

I’ve been amused by attempts to tackle this topic over the years.  For example, I discovered that in 1948, readers of the Kensington News in the Notting Hill area of London — yes, that Notting Hill — were enlisted to make suggestions for a new name for a local “Home for the Aged Poor.”  The solicitation was suggested by a mayor who remarked after “seeing the happy contented faces of the inhabitants and the light and cheerful premises,” that a better name was needed and he offered to “award a guinea book-token for the best suggestion received.”  

Readers took to the task with apparent zeal.  My research has not yet revealed the winner, but each week the newspaper ran multiple suggestions — ranging from quirky to, I assume, ironic in nature.  Some of my favorites?  

“The Anchorage.”  “Dunromin,”and  “The Welcome Home.” 

The most common suggestion that I read in one week’s list seemed to be variations on “Twilight” — but back then there was no connection to the teen-vampire romance series of book and movie fame that might have at least lightened that identity.  

Okay — time to get back to my Fulbright project.