What’s in a name?

Practically all big pleasure boats and commercial vessels have names, and a story lies behind almost every name.

Port Aransas boaters have named their crafts to honor the women in their lives, to celebrate good times, to make note of meaningful experiences and simply to inject some humor into the maritime experience.

Brian Cody and friend Randy Pritchard bought their boat, a 35-foot Cabo, in an online auction seven years ago. Naturally, they named it High Bid.

Brian’s uncle, Aaron Chambers, also co-owns the High Bid.

Nate Forbes said he named his 38-foot Bertram Iced Down because something’s always chilling on his boat.

“The beer’s on ice, and the fish is on ice,” Forbes said.

Some names are suggestive. Sextrovert and Seaduction are among those kinds of boats in Port Aransas waters.

Other boat owners go for plays on words. The Fishy-a-Knot-O and the Blood Vessel belong to some punsters who dock their boats at Island Moorings Marina.

Many boats, of course, have women’s names. In Port Aransas waters, you’ll see the Marissa Lamar, Adventurous Betty, Marguerite, Lady Lee, Josie, Laura Lynn, Sybil Ludington and Misti Marie.

At Dennis Dreyer Municipal Harbor, you’ll see the Polly Anna. A 96-foot steel catamaran-style shrimp boat, it’s among the most imposing vessels in the harbor. And it’s actually the third in a line of Polly Annas, all owned by John Nixon of Port Aransas.

The first Polly Anna was a 38-foot bay shrimp boat that John built about 40 years ago.

The second was a 65-foot shrimp boat that John built with his brother, T.C. Nixon, and their father, Doss Nixon, in 1974.

John and T.C. built the present-day Polly Anna in the late 1980s.

John named the Polly Annas after his daughter. He and T.C. and their father also built an 80-foot shrimp boat called the Miss Molly, named after John’s wife, in the late 1970s.

John never named any boats after his two sons, Neal and Mark.

“I just thought I should name them after girls, and they were my girls,” John said. “I couldn’t name a boat after a boy. It might sink.”

Some anglers have shown a certain amount of fishing bravado when they named their boats. There’s the Trophy Hunter, for instance. And the Goin’ Deep.

Some names might show something about their owners’ boating attitudes. Port Aransas boats like this include the Cheers, Stir It Up, Going Coastal, Whap Bam Boom, Escapade, Carpe Diem and Reel Attitude.

And there’s the Tenacious, a 37-foot Endeavor ketch rig originally built in 1982 and now docked at Island Moorings Marina. John Conkin lives aboard the vessel, which be bought from a couple. The previous owners named it the Tenacious for a reason.

“It took them a awhile to rake the money together to buy it, and to convince the previous owner to take their offer,” Conkin said.

Another live-aboard at Island Moorings is Pat Fitzgerald, who named his 32-foot Fuji ketch rig the Tic Toc as a commentary on the passage of time. He says he doesn’t care much about what time it is most days, he said. He doesn’t wear a watch.

The boat’s name also figures into the fact that Fitzgerald is 58 years old. That’s not really old, of course. But, for a long time, he never expected to live to the age of 58. His mother died when she was only 52, of emphysema. His father died at the age of 37, of a heart attack.

“Time is relative, or what you make of it,” Fitzgerald said. “Time is different when you don’t expect to make it this long.”

Sometimes, a boat earns its name.

Like “Bottom Time,” a shrimp boat that inhabited Dennis Dreyer Municipal Harbor in the past, according to Jeff Logue, the harbormaster. The ramshackle vessel boat sank in its slip at least a dozen times over a period of years, Logue said. Each time someone raised it, the boat inevitably sank again not long afterward.

“That boat sank more than any other boat I’d ever seen in my life – probably because of its name,” Logue said, laughing.