Category Archives: Headline

Where is the copy editor?

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This is not a Newspaper issue, but it’s definitely a copy editing issue. Can you see the issue?

I’ll give you a minute to think about it.

Time’s up.

o dark thirty. Really?

Although it’s a well-know term for the early-morning hours using a 24-hour time reference.

It’s time, so we write about time using numerals.

It should be written like this: 0-dark-30

You can read it saying zero, or oh, but never, ever use the lowercase o.

Yes, a good copy editor should have caught this. Hell, a bad copy editor should have corrected it.

BTW — I recall running about the same type of story when I was editing Newspapers in Summit County back in the late ’80s. However, it is Interesting. Read it at The Colorado Sun.

The WORST hed of the day!

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Someone died and deserves a better hed than this. Seriously?! Here are my thoughts:

  • Being caught implies being chased. I guess that one could argue the avalanche chased the skier, but most people are not going to say that.
  • If they were wedding to using caught, I would have said, Caught up
  • The hed could have said, trapped and killed, or overrun and killed
  • The hed just should have said Backcountry skier killed in avalanche …..
  • All in all, a disappointing hed from The Colorado Sun, usually good source of info.

Impeachment: Part 2

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A lot of Newspapers trotted out the “Second Coming Type” for Trump’s Second Impeachment. Others seemed to feel that they needed to give a civics lesson and include House and President in the heds.

Once thing that’s clear. There’s no agreement on punctuation, as some went with “Impeached Again” while others went with “Impeached, Again” … As someone with copy editor blood in my veins, I believe the second hed with the comma is more correct, but without is more impactful as you can get bigger type in the line.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution went in another direction with emphatic periods:

Here’s a gallery with and without the comma:

The best example of Second Coming Type

Kudos to these Newspaper who managed to get insurrection in the heds

Some bad design choices

Some good design choices:

Of course, The Daily News does not fail to please:

Our Canadian friends can be excused for botching this hed:

As always, copyrights are held by the individual Newspapers and are culled from the Newseum.

Story behind the famous hed

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It’s a two-word hed that my good friend Tom Oder wrote in The Atlanta Journal to announce the selection of Atlanta being chosen as the site of the 1996 Olympics.

It’s a famous hed here in Atlanta, and everyone who was around at the time remembers it … I think fondly.

For those who think that headlines are easy to write, Oder gives a very thorough outline of how that came about.

The Saporta Report

Then, about 3:30 one morning, a week to 10 days before the announcement as I was driving to work and navigating the Brookwood Curve heading south on I-85, it hit me. It’s Atlanta!

It was like the car illuminated, and I saw the page in front of me.

Tom Oder

Hit the link above. It’s well worth it.

Welcome to the latest fictional newspaper!

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Well, there is a Bailey’s Crossroads in Virginia, but the Bugle is entirely fictional newspaper, thanks to The Man in the High Castle – Season 4, Episode 5 (Mauvaise Foi).

I won’t get into the sci-fi of the alt universes here, but some let me throw some shade on that school board headline:

Crossroads Budget Hinge on Eduction

First, It should be Hinges.

Second, the text of the article repeats and seems to be a back to school story.

AND, that hedline SUCKS!

Overthinking ‘Dumbo’

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V. A. Vandevere, aka Batman, aka Michael Keaton reads The New York Herald in the latest “Dumbo” from Disney and Tim Burton.

In the latest Dumbo movie, there’s this scene where V. A. Vandevere reads about Dumbo’s flying…

I love that they’ve used a real life newspaper, The New York Herald. Assuming the timeline of the movie is pre 1924, the Herald would have been around.

I love the heds, but not so crazy about the all caps:

WONDER ELEPHANT SOARS TO FAME

MIRACLE MAMMOTH STARTLES

OUR REPORTER ATTESTS: ‘THE TALE OF DUMBO IS TRUE!’

… fake headlines

Where I have a problem is the photo. Let’s take a closer look:

Dumbo

So, it’s a pretty cool photo of a flying elephant, but notice that it’s taken from above, which means:

A. The photographer was somehow positioned at the top of the tent,

B. Only the camera was up there and the photog somehow managed to trigger the camera, somehow, again, managing to perfectly frame Dumbo AND have a sharp focus.

C. There is no C.

I know I’m overthinking this, but it’s the little details, right?

Who’s with me?