That Name

(Charlie) Jacob Frederick Galbraith-Chan is quite a name for a tiny baby.  We mainly chose the names because we like them.  But they all come from people in our family.

Jacob: My mother's father, Jakub Rotblit.  Her parents divorced when she was around two.  She told me that she met her father only two or three times in her life.  My sister, Marysia, has been doing research on the family.  She has come up with little information about him.  (I'll link to her blog, http://uncoveringjewishheritage.wordpress.com/,  when she posts what she's found.)  

Frederick: My father's paternal uncle, Frederick Fletcher Galbraith.  I never met him and the stories I heard about him were never positive.  He was an unpleasant man who died young from alcohol.  But he also had tragedy in his life.  His daughter was killed by a car on her way to kindergarten.  The story stuck with me because I was told it as a boy crossing the street near my father's childhood home where the accident happened.

Neither Jacob Rotblit nor Frederick Galbraith are much remembered. I like the idea of giving them some measure of new life by bestowing their names on Baby Charlie.

Charlie: After Shih Han's father, Charlie Chan Khoo Fong.  Charlie was the name bestowed on himer by British soldiers in World War Two.  They were making a joke at his expense naming him after Charlie Chan, the Chinese detective, played by a white guy in a series of Hollywood movies in the 1930's and 1940's. But Shih Han's father took it in stride and was happy to be called Charlie. So Charlie will be Baby Charlie's nickname, the same way Bessie is Baby Bessie's nickname.