CONCORD, N.C. - Love is in the air in Cabarrus County. It's also in the phone book — many, many times.
Cabarrus has the nation's highest concentration of people named Love — eight times more per capita than the national average — according to a Valentine's-week study by a San Diego marketing research firm.
Union, Gaston and Mecklenburg counties aren't far behind Cabarrus, making North Carolina one of the nation's Love-liest states.
Clementeene Love Glover of Gastonia said her maiden name is telling: "I'm just a friendly, happy-go-lucky person. I love my family and I love people."
"It's a beautiful name, Love," she said. "It's a way of life."
The demographers at Claritas Inc. tossed around several monikers — Romeo, Casanova, Cupid — in their search for Loves.
They tried Lust, too. But even where Lust is popular (first place: Oneida County, N.Y.), Love prevailed.
Although the Charlotte region has, comparatively, a whole lot of Love, the surname accounts for only a small part of the population.
Researchers looked at U.S. counties with populations of more than 100,000 and ranked those with the highest concentrations of the Love surname. Just 0.03 percent of the national population is named Love, and Cabarrus County's Loves make up 0.24 percent of the county's population.
But demographers say no name does much more — not even Smith, the most popular, which in 1990 was held by only slightly more than 1 percent of U.S. residents.
