# Shop sign's with apostrophe's. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 17, 2008, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686 "2008-05-17T21:16:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2008, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/101 "2008-05-22T20:37:57Z")
> [@](#): > > Actually, the Board on Geographic Names has that authority in the United States, and they’ve been booting out apostrophes since 1894–giving us such anomalies as Harpers Ferry and Devils Tower. That article claims there are only four apostrophes in US towns. That _can’t_ be right. I’m sure I’ve found others. And the article doesn’t mention [BCouer d’Alene\*\*: [http://www.coeurdalene.org/index.asp?PageId=343](http://www.coeurdalene.org/index.asp?PageId=343) ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2008, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/102 "2008-05-23T07:16:18Z")
[QUOTE=CalMeacham] That article claims there are only four apostrophes in US towns. That _can’t_ be right. I’m sure I’ve found others. And the article doesn’t mention **Couer d’Alene** : [/QUOTE] I think the article is refering to actual decisions made by the BGN. Couer d’Alene never lost its apostrophe, so it didn’t have to get permission to get it back. One of the first acts of the BGN was to decree that all diacritics (and they include apostrophes in that category) were to be removed from American geographic names. Well, that’s putting it a bit more strongly than is the reality. The board just made that a rule for approving names, but the Post Office put it into effect for existing names. Didn’t work for all of them, such as Couer d’Alene, although that name did lose a circumflex on one of its Es. As for other apostrophes in American names, there’s three counties in Maryland with them. And the town of D’Lo, MS, although if you check maps from the first half of the 20th century, it’s frequently spelled Dlo. Not sure if the BGN made a decision on that one or not. But one line in that article struck me as slightly bizarre: > [@](#): > > the board exists to this day and is to thank for restoring the ‘h’ to Pittsburgh This is a little bit like giving the Nazis credit for the survival of Jews in central Europe. Another of the BGN’s initial decrees was to drop the H at the end of _-burgh_s. The Post Office also put this into effect for existing names, but the locals in Pittsburgh objected. There was a long battle over that letter that the locals finally won, but there wouldn’t have been a battle at all if not for the BGN. ---
**Author:** ![bathsheba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9e8a1a/32.png) [@bathsheba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bathsheba)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2008, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/103 "2008-05-23T12:01:20Z")
Not a shop sign but I attended a conference today where “emphasises” was spelled “emphasis’s”. ---
**Author:** ![Labrador\_Deceiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7c8e57/32.png) [@Labrador\_Deceiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labrador_Deceiver)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2008, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/104 "2008-05-23T12:32:41Z")
[QUOTE=Apollyon] If you read the quotes as marking an actual quote, (as might be said by a perky service person), rather than serving as scare-quotes, then it could as easily be genuine. 🙂 [/QUOTE] That’s exactly what it means. All Chick-fil-A employees are instructed to reply with “My pleasure” any time a customer says “Thank you.” It’s a bit of a joke around here. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2008, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/105 "2008-05-23T20:18:06Z")
[QUOTE=pulykamell] I’ve been looking around, but I can’t find a style guide that advocates spelling out numbers one through nine. [/QUOTE] > **[Welcome | | Western Washington University](https://chss.wwu.edu/journalism)** AP Style manual does. From browsing other sites, it looks like Strunk and White used to have this rule but changed it in a more recent edition. ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2008, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/106 "2008-05-23T21:30:23Z")
Ugh! My partner just sent out invitations today for our lunch on Sunday. \*\*Dalej42 \*\*will be making his famous margarita’s. I hate having emails going out when I can’t proofread them. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2008, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/107 "2008-05-24T04:19:49Z")
McGill University, April 2008. Hundreds of students hanging out in a lobby, waiting to go to into the gym to write their final exams. As a form of crowd control, the door to the hall that leads to the gym is closed, and there is a security guard telling people that they can’t go in yet. Also, on the door, is a sign that reads\* ```auto Please do not enter B-4 the exam's ``` I nearly cried, and not because I was worried about my exam\*\*! \*The exact wording was likely different, but the B-4 and the apostrophe were as reported here. \*\*Which I got 93% on… turns out I’m good at ordinary differential equations! Obviously irrelevant to this thread, but I want to brag! ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/108 "2008-06-06T05:45:49Z")
A tiny bit of a necro, but when i saw this I immediately thought of this thread and had to update/share it. [http://graphjam.com/2008/06/04/song-chart-memes-angry-for-bad-grammar/](http://graphjam.com/2008/06/04/song-chart-memes-angry-for-bad-grammar/) ---
**Author:** ![Yorikke](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yorikke/32/4335_2.png) [@Yorikke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yorikke)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/109 "2008-06-06T06:19:13Z")
I just moved away from a city (Visalia, CA) that was home to “Jone’s Towing.” It was on every tow truck. No, I checked. Nobody named “Jone” is involved. Joe ---
**Author:** ![Yorikke](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yorikke/32/4335_2.png) [@Yorikke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yorikke)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/110 "2008-06-06T06:21:12Z")
[QUOTE=Jragon] A tiny bit of a necro, but when i saw this I immediately thought of this thread and had to update/share it. [http://graphjam.com/2008/06/04/song-chart-memes-angry-for-bad-grammar/](http://graphjam.com/2008/06/04/song-chart-memes-angry-for-bad-grammar/) [/QUOTE] Isn’t that the greatest non-Dope site evar? Joe ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/111 "2008-06-06T06:29:58Z")
> [@](#): > > AP Style manual does. From browsing other sites, it looks like Strunk and White used to have this rule but changed it in a more recent edition. Shit. There was a word missing in my sentence. I meant to write that I couldn’t find a style manual that _doesn’t_ advocate spelling out one through nine. **Cisco** was saying you only spell out numbers in the beginning of a sentence, and I was trying to say that I don’t know of a single manual that encourages you to use numerals instead of written out forms for one through nine. Unfortunately, I missed a very important word there. Whoops. ---
**Author:** ![Sigmagirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c89c15/32.png) [@Sigmagirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmagirl)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/112 "2008-06-06T14:05:56Z")
Ages are always numeric; “She was a 9-year-old girl.” But that is a newspaper exception. ---
**Author:** ![Ellen\_Cherry](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellen_cherry/32/3600_2.png) [@Ellen\_Cherry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellen_Cherry)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/113 "2008-06-06T14:36:37Z")
At Wal-Mart I noticed some beauty magazines specific to hairstyling. I swear before God and everybody that the very title of one of these magazines was **Short Hair Style’s**. ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/114 "2008-06-06T14:58:22Z")
[QUOTE=Siam Sam] I am reminded of the time in Pokhara, Nepal, when the wife and I were strolling past a small restaurant that listed it’s specialties out front on a chalkboard. Prominently at the top was: “Western Breakfast’s.” And there was this ancient-looking British lady chastising a sheepishly grinning employee over the apostrophe, demanding it be removed forthwith. [/QUOTE] Gaudere strikes again. (its specialties, not it’s specialties) ---
**Author:** ![jali](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecae2f/32.png) [@jali](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jali)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/115 "2008-06-06T15:04:14Z")
[QUOTE=LurkMeister] Slowly I turned… [/QUOTE] Step by step… ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/116 "2008-06-06T16:10:55Z")
[QUOTE=Oy!] Gaudere strikes again. (its specialties, not it’s specialties) [/QUOTE] Yes, that was pointed out to me on the first page. Now I’m humiliated all over again and must go back in for more therapy. The Horror! The Horror! ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2008, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686/117 "2008-06-06T16:22:46Z")
There’s a huge banner I see every day from the subway train as I go to and from work. It’s stretched across the back of a car dealer’s lot. I don’t quite remember what it says, but it’s enclosed in completely-unnecessary quotes. I think I’m going to start photographing these errors and putting them on a Stupid Toronto Blog of Shame (right next to the Ugly Toronto Blog of Shame I also plan to start in order to protest litter, scratchitti, excessive paving, etc). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shop-signs-with-apostrophes/449686.md?page=5)