Tonya Bolden: Hello. My name is Tonya Bolden. My first name is spelled T-O-N-Y-A. My last name rhymes with "golden." It's my understanding that when it came to naming me, my parents were at one point torn between Alicia and Beryl, when a close friend suggested Tonya. When I was in college, my first Russian teacher told me that my name was short for Antonina. My Russian teachers called me "Tonya" and sometimes "Tonichka."