The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

Misplaced punctuation An acquaintance ofmie a professional writer and editor, has a spelling block. On any given day, you would fet equal odds this person would misspell e word it's. e its fraternal twm sister it&) Out would corne phrases such as: The dog wagged it's tai!. Or: itioo W8l7flgo Wnte stuf. (And everyone knows it should be: The dog wagged is tail. And: Ies too warm té %Wite So how is it that a columnist for one of North Aneieas largest newspapers would commit an error we would not expect from a fourth grader? Dogged unfiorgiing1 ammrinount your soaphoxes: "Ift is the sppery standards of our sehool system! ti h infidels at the gate! It is the pizza man and he is on time!" The truth lies ini biology. You've heard of reading readiness? That when the human brain develops to a certain point it becomes capable of learning to read. Try to foroe reading before that point and ail you get is soggy cereal. Swan's theoiy says that gramrnar-readiness and spelling-rediness work the sarne way. You. work your whole life to get your brain ready for one specifie littie fact: then wham! That's the day you skipped school- by conning Mom into thinking you had the measies. (And you brought about a miraculous recovery after ho ckey coach phoned with news of an exhibition game that night!) Syou miss thtoedy. Zap Your brain synapses grow over. Neyer again will yo:Lb ready ta, diffest that one fact, ta spout it back. Aways youil ask. afth~ e Urne you'll guess wrong. Couple a writer like that with a copy editar with the samie affliction and youll get it right one Urne in four. Which isn't very good odds. And speil check won't help a bit, either. My friend the editor is not alone. In the past few weeks rve picked up a scatterrng of punctuation anomalies: Most oft repeated: the following appeared in the June issue of the Canadian edition of Reader's Digest, in a ful page (digest format) advertisement for a pain reliever. Main headie read as follows, in 18 point bold type: Ostoarthitiis mayvhave it's complica iions, Bu t pa m reliefdoent h ave ito Imagine, being able ta spell osteoarthritis and spelhing iAs wrong. (it>s comphications when it should have been ita complications, (its is the abbreviation of it isâ, which of course makes no sense. Reader's Digest boasts, on the cover of this-sarne issue, of a monthly circulation of 27 million. A reasonable guess would say this ad appeared only ini the Canadian edition. Wh still likely puts it up there close ta the million mark? (That's only a guess; RD doesn't say.) Other misplaced punctuatio-n: Durham College Athletic Complex stili posts sign for washrooms: MENS' and fiurther on ini the same hallway: WOMENS'- (MEN'S and WOMEN'S for those who missed school thaàlei uIr day.) out pries, we should give one for the world's largest punctuation error. This one appears on a bilîboard-size sigi at Oshawa General Hospital announcing the sucessu, completion of a recent fund- raising drive. The sign announces, in type about eighteen inches high (thats 1,300 point type for those typographers in Weô~esdmy, iuVe ~ ,Pa~ s- rb. I. 1 TESTERDIW.. OLDEST MEMBEIRS 0F WHrIBY VIRE DEPARTMENT 1931 This picture was taken on the retirenient of William H. Smith as P'ire Chief. Prom left to right are George Mowat, William H. Smith William -Thompson, Arthur Hopper. The silver water service was won by Whitby Fine lN>partment at te firefighters' games in Port Hope in 1889 and will be on di splay in the new fire hall on Taunton Road to open this fali. Whltbyàrcliiveu photo 10 YEARS AGO Prom the Wenesd June 19 1985 edition of the w9wiFm'EM fEEss " The dates of the Korean War, 1950-1953 were added te the Cenotaph in a special ceremony on June 16. " Despite proteste council's administrative committee has approved a medical waste transfer station iÏor Whitby. " Brooklin residenta are protesting the closure of their Credit Union office on Baldwin Street. " More than 100 runners will participate'in a one-mile road race on.Brock Street, hosted by the Whitby Tigers Rünning Club. 35 YEARS AGO Prom the Thursday, June 16, 1960 edition of the WB1TBY'VWEEKLY NEWS " Four Fairview Log residents celebrated over-90 birthdays. They are: Catherine Stevenson, 92; Fred-Littie, 94; Alice Grahamn, 95 and Emma Louise Gibson, 95. " Town Council paid an officiai visit to Lindsay te discuss local government issues. " Ontario Minister of Health, Dr. Matthew B. Dymond addressed the nurses' grduating class at the Ontario Hospital. 0 Gorg Brooks of Dunlop Tire was elected District Six Director of the International Rubr Workers. 80 YEARS AGO Prom the Thursa,, June 17, 1915 edition of the WM137 TTE AND CKRONICE " A new refrigerater lias been Eurchased for the Ontario County House of Refuge. " Myrtle sterekeeper Thomas W. Brookes lias installed a 200-gallon gasoline tank to serve motoriste,, " Two prisoners who tried to escape from the Asylum Farm were sentenced te two years in Kingston Penitentiary as an exmle te others. " A Chicago lawyer who grewtup in Whitby bas içiven a motor car te the Toronto Base Hospital for use in France. àti called "eWMhy.ff e.