Why does anyone change their name? There are probably as many reasons as there are people who change their names.

My parents named me Linda. Very popular name in the late '40s, early '50s. I got tired of having 4 or 5 other Lindas in every class in school. I found out in 1970 that if you change 3 characters or fewer, you don't need to go through probate to change your name. (By the way, this was right after I married and took my husband's surname -- never did THAT again!) So I changed my first name to Linn because I liked the double "N" thing, used it for 7 years (to make it legal) and changed it with everybody including the IRS.

After I got my family name (Schulz) back after I divorced my first husband, I swore I'd never change my name again. Tom kept his maiden name (Hall) so I did, too. Occasionally we hyphenated it to avoid confusion, but mostly not.

Linn