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In the English language (and predominantly American English), it is relatively common to see a (limited) set of first and middle names that form initials used as a shortened version of the given names. (ex. TJ, JT, DJ). Thomas John Washington becomes TJ Washington. Where does this practice come from and why those handful of specific initials?

Greybeard
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WakeDemons3
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    It comes from people who wanted a shorter way to refer to someone. – Jim Mar 01 '18 at 01:31
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    You mean, why is it that some initials seem to be preferentially used (as in "tee jay" for the initials T J) and others (eg, "ess are" for S R) are not? Because "tee jay" just has a snappy sound to it. – Hot Licks Mar 01 '18 at 02:25
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    Where does this practice come from? - I cannot imagine what kind of answer you are looking for. – Drew Mar 01 '18 at 03:07
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    Are you referring to people who are commonly addressed by their initials? I'm not aware that this is limited to particular letters. People's nicknames evolve within their family for all sorts of reasons, not necessarily logical. – Kate Bunting Mar 01 '18 at 09:20
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    @Kate There is absolutely a finite set of these that stays relatively constant over the course of decades. No one is named "S.R.", "Z.Q.", or "L.B.". – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 16:27
  • @Drew Etymology is one of the most common categories of questions here. Is it your first day? – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 16:27
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    Welcome to EL&U. This is not really a question about the language itself, but of a particular social convention; I would consider it a form of hypocorism. I would dispute that it is "relatively common," however; if anything, the practice has declined sharply since the mid-20th century, when name diversity increased and the need to include middle initials to distinguish between 10 Williams or 10 Marys in intimate situations declined. – choster Mar 01 '18 at 16:32
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    @choster You would be hard pressed to argue that my question doesn't fall under the "U" part of EL&U. – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 17:05
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    I’ve upvoted, because this is an excellent question, and one which I have wondered about myself: why is it specifically those three sets of initials that are so common? However, you should edit the question to be more specific about what your research has been: what you’ve searched for, what articles you’ve found and read, etc. You may also want to specify that this is a very American phenomenon—notably, I believe Kate and choster, who do not recognise the central point, are both British, which explains why it doesn’t ring a bell with them. (Or maybe choster isn’t…) – Janus Bahs Jacquet Mar 01 '18 at 20:50
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I'm not really sure what more to say about the research. There's nothing. No one has asked this question before on any forum on the internet. No official repositories of etymology or initialisms have info on using them as nicknames. There's nothing – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 21:06
  • @WakeDemons3 Well, there are some indirect pieces of evidence. This page gives a bunch of names that make for good initials, and these all confirm to my instinctive ideas of common initial-names. Then there’s this page where someone made a heat map of the most common initials—you can compare and see if name combinations that match the common initial-names are particularly common, for instance. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Mar 01 '18 at 21:12
  • This question is very similar to this one – Dispenser Mar 01 '18 at 21:14
  • @Dispenser My question asks for an etymological answer, which isn't nearly as subjective. – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 21:17
  • See related information (possibly speculative) at http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OnlyKnownByInitials – Mark Beadles Mar 01 '18 at 23:02

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I'm having a hard time finding sources for this, thus all of the following is from my own head.

A name like JT can come from having a given name they would rather not use, and a first + middle name that says JT, or JR, or anything else. Hyphenated first names aren't very common in English speaking countries but someone might also abbreviate something like Jean-Baptiste into JB.

If the second letter is J, in my experience it almost always refers to "junior". The reason someone might be called DJ is because they were named after their father named Douglas, David, whatever, and instead of others in the family calling both people the same name, they call one a shortened version. Maybe Doug, maybe David, but also maybe DJ (Doug Junior).

Dispenser
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    You acknowledge that you don't have sources, which I understand. But I've never heard of that first part. Every TJ, BJ, or DJ I've met has had a J middle name, making the letters initials. Like "Thomas John Lastname". I've never heard of a Junior being the J, and that would be structurally different than my question. – WakeDemons3 Mar 01 '18 at 21:20
  • I knew a lot of guys named Chris and David growing up, some of them ended up as CJ or DJ not because their middle name was a J middle name, but because they were Juniors. That's purely off personal experience, specifically experiences from elementary to high school, a while back. Some people did have J initals from their middle name, but not all, in my experience. – Dispenser Mar 01 '18 at 21:29