Star Trek fans boldly name kids
WHAT’S YOUR NAME?
Amutual love of all things Star Trek has this Port Elgin couple in a mind meld.
Save for a bit of tinkering with spellings, these sci-fi devotees boldly went ahead with a Star Trek theme for the names of all three of their children. Both Shaun and Deb McLaren grew up watching the various Star Trek series — on one of their first dates they watched Deb’s favourite, the Enterprise series. “Real romantic,” jokes Shaun. “I was 8 years old when I watched (The Next Generation) from the very first episode. I followed it religiously.”
Deb also watched the series premiere, with her dad. But it wasn’t until Shaun met his future in-laws that “I knew I really had something. Her dad took me down into their basement . . . and when he opened up the room, it was a little room devoted to a model train track, and around it, on the whole wall, were Star Trek novels.”
Deb’s father, a teacher, would spend his lunch reading the series. When her parents downsized, Shaun got all the books.
Then, when they were expecting their first child, a boy, “Shaun suggested Patrick for Patrick Stewart — Captain Jean-Luc — I liked it,” she recalls. “We changed the spelling slightly, and named our firstborn Patrick Stuart Paul — Patrick and Stuart for the actor and Paul for Shaun’s dad.” Patrick was born in April 2005. Next on board: a daughter, Kathryn Jane Elizabeth, born in January 2007. She’s named “for the captain of the Voyager, Kathryn Janeway. Elizabeth is also my mother’s middle name,” says Deb. Their third, another boy, is William Ryker Alan, named after William T. Riker, first officer of the Starship Enterprise. Alan is after Deb’s father. Patrick is now 8, Kathryn 6, and William, born in June 2010, is 2 — maybe a bit young to fully appreciate the Star Trek series. But the next generation of this Port Elgin family has come to love Star Wars, which Shaun sees as a good sign. “They know where their names come from . . . captains of their own ships, they think that’s pretty cool.” Did you give your child an interesting or unusual name? Email krushowy@thestar.ca