What's Perdue's first name?

Quick: What's the first name of the Democratic gubernatorial nominee?

If you said "Beverly," you'd be correct. But if you said "Bev," you'd also be correct.

Lieutenant Governor Perdue has gone by both names in her time in office, but her campaign currently seems to be promoting "Bev" over "Beverly."

Both her campaign and official Web sites list her as "Bev," as have a number of mailers and e-mails. (Her official lieutenant governor's Web site, however, has more than a few references to "Beverly" on it.)

Perdue has gone back and forth professionally. In 1996, she was on the ballot as "Beverly M. Perdue," a reference to her maiden name. In 2000, she was on the ballot as "Beverly Perdue" and in 2004, she was listed as "Beverly Eaves Perdue," adopting her second husband's last name.

But she was on the May 6 primary ballot as "Bev Perdue."

More after the jump.

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Not everyone is going for the nickname, however. Republican nominee Pat McCrory's campaign, the N.C. Republican Party, regularly refers to her as "Beverly Perdue," as has Democratic Party head Jerry Meek. (Primary opponent Richard Moore stuck with "Bev," though.)

North Carolina newspapers are split, but clearly favor "Beverly." A search of the Nexis database shows 2,591 references to "Beverly Perdue" versus 348 references to "Bev Perdue" since 1994, about a seven-to-one ratio.

It's a closer race on Google, where "Beverly Perdue" returns 35,500 results and "Bev Perdue" just 22,400 pages.

The least popular variation, though, is "Beverly Eaves Perdue," which returned 1,690 pages on Google and 27 newspaper articles.