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Updated, 5:20 p.m. | After he came to America from Korea more than three decades ago, Jang Do wanted what many immigrants have always wanted: to fit in. So he decided to Americanize his name.

But at age 11, still fuzzy on the vernacular, he took an interesting tack.

First he turned "Jang" into "John." Then, he talked his family into adding an "e" to their last name. He was concerned, he said, about razzing and wanted to make sure it would be pronounced like the "do" in "tae kwon do" and not the "do" in "hairdo."

He has been John Doe ever since.

Airport security grills him every time he flies. "I have to sit in the office," he said. "Every time." Landlords and election inspectors view him quizzically, and prospective dates need more than a little assurance that he's not hiding a dark past.

"I say my name is John Doe and they say, 'No, what's your real name?' and I pull out my ID," he said.
John DoeMichelle V. Agins/The New York Times Does the postman think twice?

Now a 40-year-old software programmer with a degree from Carnegie Mellon, he lives and is registered to vote on the Upper West Side, after short stints living in the San Francisco Bay area and abroad. He said the man who holds the lease to his apartment was first "incredulous about my name.'' But references were checked, and the wire with the deposit arrived, at which point, he said, the landlord called back and said: "I guess you're real. Welcome to New York.''

Mr. Doe is hardly the first person to contend with such issues. The name is a centuries-old legacy of the English legal system where John Doe was often used as a stand-in for the real name of a witness who sought to protect his identity.

But there are plenty of the genuine articles around. John Doe of Alpharetta, Ga., who died in 2006, was a loan officer who reported that medical personnel kept popping in on him when he was hospitalized, expecting to find a publicity-shy celebrity in his room.

New York State also has had its share of John Does. New York City's Department of Records shows one John Doe of Brooklyn, who married Frances P. Worth in 1885 [pdf]. Ancestry.com lists a World War I draft card [pdf] for another New Yorker named John Doe on Avenue B.

Voter registration records show seven John Does currently on the rolls in New York State in addition to Mr. Doe, who is a Democrat.

For each John Doe, of course, dating poses its own challenges, what with the propensity for people these days to Google their suitors.

"I date mostly Korean women, so I explain it's a rare Korean last name,'' Mr. Doe said, noting that "Do" in Korean is derived from the word for "path."

But will his eventual bride in America be happy to endure the snickering when they check in to their honeymoon suite as "Mr. and Mrs. John Doe''?

"That's the biggest joke, that I have to marry a Jane Doe,'' he said, "Can you imagine our signing in at a hotel as John and Jane Doe? 'Yeah, buddy.' ''

His parents avoided that problem, embracing the names James and Gloria Doe when they became citizens. As did his younger brother Kwang, who selected Anthony as his new name, paying homage to a famous Roman. "Something to do with Mark Antony," John Doe explained.

He says he has no regrets about his own choice. But he acknowledges he sometimes likes to break the mold by using his middle initial, H., for Hyun, "to give myself a little character.''

Mikey wrote:My father had a distant cousin who came to be named "Sean Ferguson" - not a common name for a Polish Jew. The man in question came to the US after WWI, and was processed at Ellis Island. A helpful friend had taught him how to say his name in English. Unfortunately, he was a bit nervous or something and when questioned about his name said, "Shayn fergessen - Yiddish for "I forget."

Sean Ferguson it was.

Foxfyre wrote:LOL I have seen some wacky name combos in the navy. Seaman Spitz being amoung the best.

Tsukiyumi wrote:

Foxfyre wrote:LOL I have seen some wacky name combos in the navy. Seaman Spitz being amoung the best.

When a friend of mine joined the Air Force, thanks to his last name, he was Airman Commander.

Lazar wrote:Who's on first?

Lazar wrote:Who's on first?