The Editor’s Desk

No wombats were harmed in the writing of this post.

A tractor-trailer hauling wombats from Tulsa, Okla., to Colorado Springs, Colo., crashed at Woodlawn Boulevard and Mount Vernon Road this morning. The wombats’ whereabouts is unknown.

If that appeared in The Eagle, you would think we had lost our minds.

In earlier posts, I wrote about using the Associated Press Stylebook and why The Eagle has its own stylebook.

Sometimes, the two don’t agree. Most of the differences are idiomatic, but a few are based on local sensibilities. In all cases, though, our style takes precedence.

Here’s a couple of examples from the idiomatic side.

The AP says use semitrailer or tractor-trailer. We think simply saying semi works just fine. AP also says that Colorado Springs, Tulsa, Little Rock, Fort Worth and many others familiar to Eagle readers need a state name to follow the city name. Yeah, OK.

On the local sensibilities side, AP says “The preferred term is black. Use African-American only in quotations or the names of organizations or if individuals describe themselves so.” Our entry says, in part: “Black Wichita residents refer to themselves as both black and African-American, and The Eagle strives to reflect community practice by accommodating both terms. While black remains the preferred term in Associated Press style, African-American is more appropriate if the subject of the story prefers it or if the story ties black subjects to their African heritage.”

Another example is AP says mentally retarded is “The preferred term for those with significantly subaverage intellectual functioning.” Our style is to use mentally disabled or developmentally disabled.

There are many other differences, but you get the idea. The Eagle is a local paper and we endeavor to reflect our community.

Oh, and the paragraph at the top? In our style it would read:

A semi hauling wombats from Tulsa to Colorado Springs crashed at Woodlawn and Mount Vernon this morning. The wombats’ whereabouts are unknown.

— Michael

Last weekend I opened my paper at home and was surprised to see Xmas in a headline. The surprise was because it goes against our style and because I was of the belief that many people find it offensive.

A bit of background: The word has a legitimate history, traced in print to the mid-1500s. The X, from the Greek chi, is for the first letter in Christ’s name. “Garner’s Modern American Usage” has a good quote on it from John Ciardi’s “A Browser’s Dictionary.” “Though commonly frowned upon by grammarians as slovenly and by the pious as profane, X has ancient antecedents as the symbol of Christ and the cross, so much so that illiterate Jews at Ellis Island refused to sign with an X, insisting on making an O, called in Yiddish kikl, little circle.”

So, while I was surprised when I opened my paper, here’s what I now find even more surprising: It’s been a week and I’ve not heard from a single reader who said it concerned them.

Has the view of some that Xmas is disrespectful waned, or are people being polite in not pointing it out?

Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

— Michael