Matt at planetmut had a splendid post about newspaper typos back in 2018, although “typos” is a wan and inadequate term for what he documents. After a minor example from the BBC (“The speaking cock turns 75 years old…”) and an amusingly bollixed-up quote from Wolverhampton Wanderers chairman Sir Jack Hayward, he gets to the good stuff: a “classic example of a production error” from the Times & Citizen (a headline reading “headline headghgh”) and the real gem, from “a 1979 edition of the now sadly defunct Peterborough Standard.” It begins:
CROWLAND’S Silver Jubilee committee was finally wound up on Thursday evening with a presentation ceremony at the library.
The jubilee fund, described by chairman Frank Parnell as ‘one of the finest efforts in Lincolnshire’, fremony at the library.
The jubilee fund, described by chairman Frank Parnell as ‘one remony atremony aremony at the library.
The jubremony at the library.
Tremony at remony at the library.
Thrremony at tremony at the liremony at the libraremony at the library.
Theremony at the library.
But it goes on and on, culminating in an “almost poetic segue” that introduces an entirely new plotline. (Ironically and perhaps inevitably, the transcription of the article contains its own error: in “Thrremony at tremony at the liremoay,” the last non-word should read “liremony,” as I have indicated in my own version above — there’s a slight blotch on the n that made the transcriber read it as an a.) To add to the fun, there is a clip of it being read aloud. As Matt says, “This is just magnificent.” Thanks, Trevor! (I should note that Trevor sent it to me with the very apposite subject line “Gertrude Stein in Peterborough.”)
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