Apostrophic Abuse

'Here’s one from the Hartford Courant: "For Ganim’s, it’s a boy." This referred to former Bridgeport Mayor Joseph P. Ganim and his wife. The apostrophe in "Ganim’s" should have been deleted, just as Ganim’s mayoralty has been deleted.'

I like the implication that bad punctuation caused the latter deletion.

They don't mention one case: "This is Ross's car." This is different from "This is the Smiths' car." You would see "This is Ross' car" a lot although it's actually wrong.

A triple whammy spotted in the branch of Starbucks in Stansted Airport - 'Pannini's' - unnecessary pluralization of a misspelled foreign word already in the plural form, topped off with an apostrophe.

Marc, that's too funny.
Oliver, can you elaborate? I always thought that names that end with an "s" do always take an apostrophe-"s".

hhp

It used to be the case that names that ended with s would take the apostrophe after without an additional s, e.g. Ross' rather than Ross's. More recently, the recommendation of most style guides is that the extra s should be added. Fowler, who always records the nuanced exception as well as the rule, notes that the older convention is maintained for Biblical names, e.g. Ross's but Moses' and Jesus'.

I can, however, record with certainty that the Ross I work with always writes Ross' and never Ross's.

I can accept a case like Ross’ where it is obvious that Ross is singular and the triple s is distracting. I would probably use Ross’s myself. And the Chicago Manual of Style gives precisely this example.

Many will have noticed that I frequently use Dwiggins’s in my posts. This makes it clear that I am talking about something that belongs to one Bill Dwiggins and not, for instance, to some fictitious Dwiggin family (e.g., the Dwiggins’ house).

— K.

Is there not an argument for the possessive plural of Dwiggins to be Dwiggenses'? Teehee.

Is there not an argument for the possessive plural of Dwiggins to be Dwigginses'? Teehee.

Too slow on the old 'Stop' button there, Chadwin. Your typo is thus saved for posterity. *sigh*

Yes, Tom. I was distinguishing the possessive plural for the Dwiggin family (hence the ‘fictitious’). Obviously not a likely mistake, because of context; but still . . .

I thought this thread was going to be about someone punching Fred Nader in the face.

Sorry to disappoint, Sparky, but a similar story is coming soon. Not about Apostrophe, but about a more serious threat to the industry.

The revival of letterpress?

hhp

The survival of Hrant.