A reader wrote me today wondering about an apostrophe in a Local and State section headline: Your opinion’s wanted.
I can see why the reader thought it was wrong. It could be read as Your opinions wanted with extraneous punctuation.
But it wasn’t a mistake. Here, the headline writer used opinion’s as a contraction of opinion is.
As always, though, I do like hearing your opinion.
Here’s a how-the-cocktail-wiener-is-made peek at the creation of the Karl Peterjohn/Tom Winters headline Sherry wrote about in her last post.
Copy editors write the headlines and then a person called the slot either signs off on them or re-writes them. Last night the copy editor working on that story wrote “Peterjohn topples Winters in county race” for the headline. “Topples” is a good verb and one we don’t use often. The problem was that it was very short, leaving an empty space that screamed “Wow, I may be interesting but I look anorexic. Can’t you fill me out?”
So the slot — that was me last night — looked for a different word.
The way I saw it, Peterjohn, who has been unsuccessful in previous runs for office, unseated an incumbent by a 14-percentage-point margin. Was the margin wider in other races? Sure. But looking at the big picture made me quite comfortable saying he overwhelmed him.
The caller Sherry refers to in her previous post had another concern. She thought it was inappropriate that the suicide-rate story continued to a page across from an advertisement with the headline “Doctor, I’m going to kill myself! . . .”
When the first papers from our state edition came off the press, members of the copy desk were aghast. They worked with our page designers to swap the rest of the suicide story with the rest of the truckers story.
That was an embarrassing juxtaposition, but we kept it out of the majority of our papers.
The voting for the March headline contest is done. Here are the winners.
Assistant sports editor Tom Seals pulled out his slingshot and took first place.
Davidson slays Goliath
That headline ran with the story about Davidson’s win over Georgetown in the NCAA Tournament.
Second place went to senior editor Michael Roehrman.
Trails and tribulations
That one was with a story about Kansas landowners suing for compensation after the government took old railroad rights of way on their properties.
Third place was by food writer Joe Stumpe.
Raising the bar
This one accompanied a story about a Wichitan whose bar-cookie recipe is a finalist in the national Betty Crocker “Bake Life Sweeter” contest.
See an Eagle headline you like or think is noteworthy? Drop me a line.
The voting for the February headline contest is done. It was an odd month for scoring. Out of all the headlines, six received votes and there was a tie for first place, second place and third. Here are the top four.
The first headline winning first place was written by online sports guru Josh Wood.
Nobody’s perfect
That headline perfectly summed up the Patriots’ surprising Super Bowl loss to the New York Giants.
The other headline taking first place was written by senior editor Michael Roehrman:
It’s crunch time
That one was with a story about the annual kickoff to Girl Scout Cookie deliveries in the area.
The first headline winning second place was written by deputy desk chief Lisa McLendon.
This time, it wasn’t Avon calling
That accompanied a story about a woman who residents of a local neighborhood said was soliciting herself door to door.
The other headline winning second place was written by copy editor Jennifer Comes.
States mine for growing lode of silver: Retirees
This one went with a story about the efforts of economic development groups to encourage seniors to resettle in their communities.
See an Eagle headline you like or think is noteworthy? Drop me a line.
A conversation going on in copy editing circles centers on the appropriateness of using “Dr.” before names.
John McIntyre of the Baltimore Sun posits: “But since people do earn doctorates, and like to use doctor with their names, and circulate among people who also like the sound of titles, the reasonable course is to follow the practice that The Times recommends: Use the title when the person has an earned degree and the holding of that degree is relevant to the context of the article.â€
Bill Walsh of the Washington Post differs, saying “If you can’t fix a broken leg, I’m not calling you ‘doctor.’ â€
I agree with these two on many points, but not this one. While context can often make clear what sort of doctor a person is, that’s not always the case. For example, take this sentence:
Dr. Reed Richards of the Kirby School of Medicine said the Modok virus could infect thousands of people and llamas.
The question becomes: Is Richards a medical doctor or a Ph.D.? An obvious assumption, since it refers to a medical school, is that Richards is physician. But what if the title is because he holds a doctorate in virology or biology? There’s no way a reader would know.
That’s where our style comes in.
The Eagle’s solution is to skip the title and be specific. Therefore, it’s family physician James Hesse, colorectal surgeon Noel Sanchez or Russian-language professor Lisa McLendon. This style imparts more information than the honorific Dr. does.
There, now that you know, don’t you feel better?
Each month I post to The Editor’s Desk the winners of our monthly headline contest. There are, however, a few newsroom contests that aren’t getting the blog love they deserve. So, let’s remedy that.
The photograph you see at left (click on it to see a larger version) is Fernando Salazar’s shot of WSU basketball coach Gregg Marshall’s reaction to the season-ending injury of one of his players. It took first place in January’s best-photo contest.
Second place went to Bo Rader for his picture of a KU touchdown in the Orange Bowl. Third place was a tie between Jaime Oppenheimer’s touching image of three girls at the end of a dance, and Mike Hutmacher’s silhouette of construction work on the downtown arena.
Don’t forget that if you want to purchase one of these or any other picture from The Eagle, all you have to do is click on the “Buy Photos & Pages†link on the left side of most Kansas.com pages. If you don’t feel like clicking back to the main site from the comfy confines of our blogs, here’s a direct link.
Does thinking about the economy and personal finance make you feel like you rode a Tilt-A-Whirl after drinking a few too many mojitos? McClatchy correspondents Kevin G. Hall and Tony Pugh know how to make things stop spinning.
From the true rate of inflation for the average Jane/Joe in the country to sorting out the rebate stimulus plan, Hall and Pugh dole out answers to readers’ financial and economic questions. They’re not financial advisers but, as their Web site says, they “are available to answer your questions about the shaky economy at home and abroad, and what’s in store for ordinary Americans in the face of gathering economic storm clouds.â€
To root around or ask a question of your own, visit their forum here.
A rather irate reader called to share her opinion of us after the heading “Democrat results” appeared above a list of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama’s percentages in Tuesday’s primaries.
While Democrat and Democratic both function as adjectives, in some quarters the former is considered an insult.
In the case at hand, dropping “ic” was an oversight, not an uberslight. It wasn’t a dig at Democrats and I’m sorry if anyone was offended by the mistake.
The voting for the first monthly headline contest of 2008 is done. Here are the winners.
First place was written by copy editor Julie Mah.
Texas has carbon
footprint the size of . . .
That headline appeared with a story about the Lone Star state producing more greenhouse gases than California and Pennsylvania — the second- and third-ranking states — combined.
Second place went to senior editor Michael Roehrman:
Chalk and awe
That one was above a story about a fourth-grade class at Gammon Elementary being excited to meet their pen pal, a soldier who recently returned from his second tour in Iraq.
Third place also went to Roehrman.
Heaping whelping
This was with a story about the Kansas Humane Society having so many puppies that they were offering them for half price.
See an Eagle headline you like or think is noteworthy? Drop me a line.