Osborne Seeks Word on Lede; Whitworth Proves it Pays to Peruse the Pearl.

ABC Brad Whitworth, IABC Fellow and past chairman who collects a paycheck as communication manager at Hewlett-Packard's Computing Systems operation in Cupertino, Calif., e-mails, "People have been questioning my sanity for keeping an empty Pringles potato crisps container on my desk at work." Seems it's a reminder to apprise CW's cubicle that "I find the choice of words on the cardboard canister that holds the... crisps to be very poor. At worst, it's deceitful. At best, it's unappetizing. In tiny print, under Questions? Comments?...you find the following:

"'Canister contains at least 50 percent recycled material; 15 percent post consumer content.

"I always wondered why Pringles tasted the way they do. The truth-in-labeling law explains it all. I assume the people at Procter and Gamble meant to say 'Canister made from at least 50 percent....'"

As Whitworth knows, it pays to peruse the pearl, i.e., type measuring about five points; you never know what you'll find. (At least P&G nailed canister, which is more than can be said for editors at The New Yorker, who twice admitted the doubled -n spelling (pp. 70, 74) in the 1/31/2K edition. The QED doesn't show cannister, nor do the desktop dictionary elite save Merriam-Webster's 10th.

* In PR Week for 3/20, reporting on San Francisco's Corsi Agency acquiring Carter Israel, staff writer Aimee Grove said, "Corsi principal Marc Corsi takes the reins as CEO." Alas, the innominate cutline writer chose the royal road: "Corsi...taking reigns as CEO." Aimee rules... reigns.

* Valued correspondent Kathleen Much, who edits copy at a think tank in the shadow of Stanford University, was reading a newsletter for writists. A paragraph that said a press kit should include blurbs or testimonials also suggested, "Don't send a sheath of copies...." KM properly notes, "Of course the author meant 'sheaf,' not 'sheath'. Spelling by ear again." Much spotted another bizarre miscue in her San Jose Mercury News of 3/9. It read, "The [art] work, a tempura panel painted around 1425...."

Our woman in Menlo Park took the writer back to art school: "I think your reporter had fried egg on his mind -- 'tempera' paint binds the pigment with egg; 'tempura' is a Japanese culinary method of deep-frying."

* "For the past 30 years I have worked in print journalism, p.r., and technical communication, and in all my experience have never seen the word 'lede' used (where I would expect it to be 'lead') and I can find no reference that explains your usage or spelling to me," e-mails Sandie Osborne, who is senior proposal manager at The Oceanic Institute in Waimanalo, Hawaii. She adds "I am the one in the office with an OED under my desk; all three editions of Fowler's, and countless style manuals from GPO to New York Times from Chicago to 'Wired Style.' Can you enlighten me? Mahalo (thanks) for your attention.

Komo mai (you're welcome...I think). I like lede because it's not confusible with noun LEAD, not even for a moment. And lede is legit usage, if you agree with Richard Weiner in his Webster's New World Dictionary of Media and Communications (Macmillan, 1996) where the variant term is defined as "the correct, original spelling (though it is rarely used) for LEAD, as used in journalism. It may refer to the first sentence or the first part of an article, or to the primary piece, or lead article, in a publication."

Weiner segues neatly to leder, "(pronounced leeder) a major article, as in columns one and six on page one of The Wall Street Journal."

William Safire pledges his troth to lede by way of his essay "(HED) Folo My Lede (UNHED)," which runs in In Love with Norma Loquendi, the 1994 Random House collection of Safireside chats on language. At the same time he adds "To suggest this is becoming standard would be misledeing (that doesn't work; you would have to drop the e before --ing, and that would change the pronunciation of the e before the d; stick with misleading). But it has earned its place as a variant spelling, soon to overtake the original spelling for the beginning of a news article. That's lexicographic news, but I have learned never to put the story in the lede."

* Time carried an interesting piece by Jeffrey Kluger (3/27) headed The Amistad Sails Again. In it Kluger observes that "the first Amistad, like many boats of the era, was intended to sail for no more than 10 years before being scuttled for scrap."

To scuttle a vessel is to open holes in its hull so that it will take on water and sink. So to scrap a sunken ship would surely be more costly than to cut up the vessel after running it aground or possibly putting it in a dry dock. Time might have simply closed with before being scrapped.

* RoadSmart, Amoco Motor Club's periodical for members, apologized to birders in its Spring/Summer 2000 issue for an earlier misdemeanor: identifying a roseate spoonbill as a whooping crane. Alas, on p. 19 of the same book it publishes the address of "The Smithsonian Institute National Museum of Natural History." Enter the roseate editor: Make it Institution.

Alden Wood, APR, lecturer on editorial procedures at Simmons College, Boston, Mass., writes and lectures on language usage. He is a retired insurance industry vice president of advertising and public relations.