Here’s how Wednesday Addams got her name
Blunt, sardonic, and—at least in the 1993 Addams Family Values film—surprisingly woke, Wednesday Addams is the perfect icon for these bleak modern times. And a new letter published in The New Yorker reveals how she got her name. The letter is a response to The New Yorker’s July story called “The Addams Family Secret,” which is about a massive 14×4 foot Charles Addams painting known as “An Addams Family Holiday.” Originally painted for a hotel in the Hamptons, the canvas mural was eventually transferred to Penn State after an alumnus bought the hotel. And reader Joan Blake writes in to say:
It was a pleasure to see a copy of Charles Addams’s painting “An Addams Family Holiday” printed in the magazine (Sketchbook, July 9th & 16th). I met Addams in New York more than fifty years ago. I lived in North Carolina, but had travelled to the city for a court case involving the custody of my children. I was staying with my college roommate, and she threw a large party, which Addams attended. I was so depressed that I sat on the couch all evening. Addams sat down beside me and asked what was wrong. I told him. He took my arm, walked me to the elevator, and took me to P. J. Clarke’s. He made me laugh and told me that the Addams Family was being made into a television show, and that he had no name for the little girl. I said, “Wednesday—Wednesday’s child is full of woe.” And Wednesday became her name.