Holiday Calendar

National Katie Day

Next celebratedWednesday, October 14, 2026

In 2004 Katie was the ninth most popular baby girls' name in England and Wales and 102nd in the United States: the same five letters, 93 places apart. October 14 belongs to all of them.

Countdown to the day
--DAYS
--HRS
--MIN
--SEC
Last updated September 6, 2026 · by the Holiday Calendar TeamHave an update or spot an error?
YEARLY DATEOctober 14
OBSERVED INInternationally
CATEGORYNames
ORIGIN

Community Origin

FOUNDING ENTITY
Not documented
FIRST OBSERVED
Not documented
HOW THE HOLIDAY CAME TO BE

An origin with no paperwork.

No founder, establishing announcement or first observance for National Katie Day appears in any source consulted for this page. The earliest dated traces of it in the Internet Archive are calendar listings rather than announcements, which leaves the day's own beginning undocumented.

+ Know the story? Submit a founder Help us complete this holiday
INTRO

Two national registries put Katie 93 places apart

National Katie Day arrives every October 14 for a name that two national registries cannot agree about. In 2004 Katie was the ninth most popular name given to baby girls in England and Wales. The same year, in the United States, it ranked 102nd.

That is not a rounding error between two countries that share a language. It is the same five letters, in the same twelve months, sitting 93 places apart.

The day itself is the thinner story. No founder, no proclamation and no first observance turn up for National Katie Day in any source. The name is the part with a record, and it runs back to 1880.

Advertisement
ORIGINS

Katie Day history

CHAPTER 01

Seventeen years in, then eighty-one years out

When the United States began publishing national name counts in 1880, Katie was already inside the top 100. It ranked 76th that first year, on 303 births. It held a top 100 place for seventeen years.

What followed was not a dip. Katie spent the next 81 consecutive years outside the American top 100, from 1897 until 1977. Its decade ranking fell in every decade from the 1880s to the 1940s, then bottomed out at 421st in the 1960s.

CHAPTER 02

Back inside, and straight to the top

In 1978 Katie re-entered the top 100 at 90th. The climb after that was quick. By 1986 it had reached 38th, its best American rank in the whole 145-year series.

The second run lasted longer than the first. Katie kept a top 100 place from 1978 through 2001, twenty-four years against the original seventeen.

CHAPTER 03

Where the short form won

The registers in England and Wales tell the opposite story. In every one of the 21 years the Office for National Statistics covers, from 1996 to 2016, Katie finished ahead of Katherine, Catherine, Kate and Katy there.

It never once happened in America. Across 145 years of federal data Katie has not finished ahead of Katherine, and its closest approach came in 1981, five places behind.

Catherine was a different matter. Katie finished ahead of it in 28 separate years, the first of them 1979, and that first crossing was a genuine climb rather than a collapse on Catherine's side: between 1975 and 1980 Katie rose from 194th to 44th while Catherine barely moved.

CHAPTER 04

One Katie day carries the force of law

National Katie Day has no comparable record of its own. Nobody's name is attached to it, nothing was ever proclaimed, and what survives in the archives is a run of calendar entries rather than any founding document. A different Katie day stands on much firmer ground.

In 2019 Alaska enacted Senate Bill 78, titled "An Act establishing May 31 of each year as Katie John Day; and providing for an effective date." That day is not this one. It belongs to a particular person rather than to everyone who shares a name.

Katie John was an Ahtna Athabascan leader from the Native Village of Mentasta, in Alaska's Upper Copper River region. She fought the State of Alaska for years over subsistence fishing rights and, in the National Park Service's words, "eventually achieved victory at the Supreme Court." She raised fourteen children and six foster children, and helped build the first alphabet for the then unwritten Ahtna language.

TIMELINE

Timeline

Katie enters the federal record

The first year of United States national name data already shows Katie inside the top 100, on 303 births.

The last top 100 finish

Katie closes the year 99th, and then drops out of the American top 100 entirely.

Katie comes back at 90th

After 81 years away the name re-enters the American top 100 and begins climbing fast.

The American peak

Katie reaches 38th, the highest it has ever placed among American girls' names.

Katie John dies in Alaska

The Ahtna Athabascan leader whose subsistence fishing case reached the Supreme Court dies on May 31.

Alaska creates Katie John Day

Senate Bill 78 sets aside May 31 each year in her name, giving one Katie a day with legal force.

BY THE NUMBERS

National Katie Day by the Numbers

215,039
People named Katie, 2020 US Census
240,788
US girls named Katie at birth, 1880 to 2024
8,333
Katie births in 1986, its US peak year

GOOD TO KNOW

Surprising facts about National Katie Day

Katie never missed a single year

Katie appears in all 145 years of United States federal name data, 1880 through 2024, without one gap. It managed that while spending most of the twentieth century nowhere near the top of the list.

Hundreds of Katies are men

American records registered 499 boys as Katie between 1880 and 2024, and the 2020 Census counted 284 men and boys living with the name.

Only sixth in its own family

Among Katherine-family names in the 2020 Census, Katie ranks sixth by living population. Kathleen (547,321), Katherine (470,588), Catherine (410,557), Kathryn (316,032) and Kathy (288,053) all count more people.

The 1986 peak was not a baby boom

1986 is Katie's high point by share of all girls born, not just by raw count, and it was reached on a smaller birth cohort than either 1985 or 1987. The peak is the name rising, not the population.

WHY THIS DAY MATTERS

Why We Love National Katie Day

Decline

The registry that ranked Katie highest has now dropped it.

Katie ranked 99th in England and Wales in 2015 and 133rd in 2016, and it does not appear in the 2025 top 100 at all. The registry that once ranked it highest is the one that has now dropped it.

Record

A living count, not just a birth count

On 14 April 2026 the US Census Bureau published first-name frequencies from the 2020 Census. How many Katies are alive in America is now a published figure rather than something inferred from birth counts.

Tradition

Katies already had a day

In the Greek Orthodox name-day calendar every Katherine form, from Aikaterini to Katerina to Kaiti, is kept on 25 November. A Katie in that tradition already has a name day, and it is not this one.

GET INVOLVED

How to Celebrate National Katie Day

EDITOR'S PICK

Find your decade in the federal tables

The Social Security Administration publishes the 200 most popular names for each decade it covers. Open the decade you were born in and see whether Katie made it: https://www.ssa.gov/oact/babynames/decades/names1960s.html

COUNT

Count the Katies yourself

The Census Bureau's 2020 tables list 53,615 names with the number of living Americans carrying each one. Download the file and look Katie up, along with everyone else in your family: https://www2.census.gov/topics/genealogy/2020surnames/Names2020_FirstNames_Sex.xlsx

ASK

Ask which name is on the birth certificate

Plenty of Katies were registered as Katherine, Kathryn or Kathleen and answer to the short form anyway. Ask the Katie in your life which one the registrar actually wrote down.

SEND

Send the date to every Katie you know

Pick out the Katies in your contacts and tell them October 14 belongs to them. Include the ones who spell it Katy.

READ

Read about Katie John

She is a different Katie with a different day, an Ahtna Athabascan leader who spent years in court over her people's right to fish. The National Park Service tells her story: https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/dena-history-katie-john-day.htm

Test your knowledge

How well do you know National Katie Day?

1 / 8

In 2004, how did Katie rank among baby girls' names in England and Wales?

Answer

No. No statute, proclamation or government recognition of the day was found in any source consulted, so it is an unofficial observance.

COLOPHON

Sources

How we know what’s on this page. References, not endorsements.

9sources
8primary records
6independently dated
Primary records
US Social Security Administration2025-04-16
National data on the relative frequency of given names in the population of US births (names.zip)
Yearly counts of every US given name by sex from 1880 to 2024, one file per year. Read from an Internet Archive capture of the agency's own dataset; the copy reproduces SSA's published decade rank tables exactly across the decades tested.
View source
US Census Bureau2026-04-14
Frequently Occurring First Names in the 2020 Census by Sex
Living-population frequency, rank and sex split for 53,615 US first names, the file that puts Katie at 215,039 people and 260th overall.
View source
US Census Bureau2026-04-14
Census Bureau Releases First Name Data From the 2020 Census
The announcement giving the release date of the first-name tables and noting the statistical safeguards applied to the underlying responses.
View source
Office for National Statistics2016
Baby names in England and Wales: all baby names, 1996 to 2016 (girls)
Rank and count for every girls' name registered in England and Wales in each year from 1996 to 2016, the series that puts Katie ninth in 2004.
View source
Office for National Statistics2026-07-09
Baby names for girls in England and Wales: 2025
The current top 100 girls' names for England and Wales, in which Katie does not appear.
View source
Alaska State Legislature2019
Bill Detail: SB 78, 31st Legislature (2019-2020)
The legislative record for the bill establishing May 31 as Katie John Day, carrying its full title, its sponsors and its enacted status.
View source
US National Park Service
Celebrating Katie John Day
Denali historian Erik Johnson's account of Katie John's life in the Upper Copper River region, her subsistence fishing litigation, her family and her work on the Ahtna language.
View source
US Social Security Administration
Top names of the 1960s
The agency's own published decade rank table, used to confirm that the archived dataset reproduces SSA's official rankings before any figure was drawn from it.
View source
Additional coverage
Eortologio
Greek Orthodox name days: November
The name-day index showing that Aikaterini, Katerina, Kaiti and every other Katherine form are kept on 25 November.
View source
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE

Related holidays

THU
25
Feb 2026
National Kathy Day
Names

National Kathy Day

Kathy went to 34,766 US girls in the 1940s and 22,706 in the 1970s, then vanished: no decade since has put it among the country's 200 most popular girls' names. February 25 is its day.

137Read
THU
08
Jul 2026
National Kathryn Day
Names

National Kathryn Day

Across 146 years of American birth records, Kathryn was never once the most common spelling of its own name; it held second place for 23 unbroken years. July 8 is the day for a spelling that did not have to win.

83Read
THU
22
Oct 2026
National Anna Day
Names

National Anna Day

Frozen gets the credit for Anna and moved Elsa instead: 566 American girls the year before the film, 1,140 the year after. October 22 is Anna's own day, and not one of the twenty-three name days she already keeps falls on it.

80Read
FOR MARKETERS & CREATORS

Turn every day into a moment your audience actually shows up for.

8.4M
Monthly readers
5K+
Holidays tracked
Holiday Calendar for Brands Developer API