‘cq’ This!

Newspaper copyeditors traditionally work at a horseshoe-shaped desk, sitting around the outside, on what is called the “rim.”  Inside the U is the news editor, known as the “slot,” who doles out assignments to the editors around the rim.

In the days when copy was edited with a pencil instead of electronically, copyeditors developed a style of notation that typically involves unorthodox spellings.

When they wrote on a piece of copy "HTK," it meant "hed to kum”—or, in regular orthography, “headline to come” (later). A "dek" was the deck or sub-headline, and the "lede" (lead) the first "graf" (paragraph) of a news story. An update of a continuing story was called a “nu lede.”

These usages supposedly originated as purposeful misspellings of the editors' comments, so that linotype operators would know they were not part of the copy that was to be set in type.

One term of mysterious origin is "cq," a notation by a word or name with unusual spelling. It means essentially "this is correct—it has been double-checked, so don’t question it, even though it looks odd.” Some say it is from the Latin cadit quaestio meaning "the question is to be dropped." Others say it is a phonetic spelling of sic or "thus"—a notation used after a printed word or passage to mean “that is what is intended.”

Among radio operators "CQ" (ostensibly from the French pronunciation of the first syllables of "sécurité") indicates a general call for help, which was also interpreted to be a phonetic rendering of “seek you.”  But it's hard to make a connection between that usage and the editor's "cq."

At the paper where I worked, we also had to deal with the dreaded “B.O.M.”—initials for “business office must,” meaning a story that treated an advertiser in a favorable light and which the advertising department insisted on placing in the newspaper.

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou has done time on the rim, and has the slot man’s scars to prove it.

            The Copyeditor’s Dream

            Let me sit on the rim,

            My cup filled to the brim

            With coffee that’s pungent and hot.

            For a story I’ve red,

            I will write a nu hed

            And pass it right back to the slot.

            When he sees what I’ve done,           

            He’ll make over Page One

            With my ninety-point, eight-column banner,

            And when it hits the street,

            I’ll have the crowd at my feet

            And I’ll be the lord of the manor.

Note: Both the Bard and I will be taking next two weeks off. And I’m taking the names of those of you who are muttering that we should make our vacation permanent.  We hope to return, unscathed, to this space on July 4 with rousing Independence Day blog. Or not.

It’s 30 for 30

A recent New York Times story about a shooting ended by stating that the case would be tried by “February 30.”  A few days later, the Times published this explanation:

“An article on Thursday…misstated the schedule set by a judge for a trial in the case. The trial is expected to begin ‘by February’, not ‘by February 30.’ The error occurred when an editor saw the symbol ‘-30-’ typed at the bottom of the reporter’s article and combined it with the last word, ‘February’. It is actually a notation that journalists have used through the years to denote the end of an article.”

A further explanation pointed out that the 30 symbol is no longer much used and many journalists have never even heard of it.  It’s a victim of the computer age, in which reporters transmit their entire stories intact, not “take by take,” on 8-1/2x11 sheets of copy paper, carried one at a time to the composing room, as in typewriter days.

No one seems sure how the use of 30 began.  The most common theory is that it was a sign-off code developed by telegraph operators, perhaps from the use of the symbol XXX, which would be 30 in Roman numerals. One version suggests that the first news story sent by telegraph consisted of 30 words. Another story, whose apocryphal nature seems self-evident, is that reporters signed 30 to demand an increase in pay to $30 a week.

It has also been suggested that 30 was a British mis-reading of 80, which resembles the Bengali symbol for “farewell” and was used on correspondence in India.  Yet another theory is about a telegraph operator who remained at his post during a breaking news story, until he keeled over dead—30 hours later.

The earliest citation of 30 is in Funk’s Standard Dictionary of 1895 (pre-Wagnall, apparently), which simply states that it is the printer or telegrapher’s symbol for the end of a dispatch.  No explanation is provided.

Other theories, of greater and lesser believability, include:

            - The hash mark (#) was the typical symbol of the end of a story, and to save time, many typists didn’t hit the shift bar, so 3 was printed instead, and a zero added just for looks.

            - When the Associated Press was founded, each member was entitled to receive 30 wire stories per day.  The 30 indicated that it was the last one.

            - Wire services customarily stopped transmitting at 30 minutes past the hour.

            - It refers to the 30 pieces of silver received by Judas Iscariot for the betrayal of Christ.

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou is not yet ready to sign 30 to his dispatches, although many readers hope that he is at least up to 29. 

            A news reporter named Bertie

            Wed a copyeditor called Gertie.

                        When the stork paid a call,

                        They decided “That’s all,”

            And that’s why they named the kid Thirty.