There’s many a slip ...

Press, 28 December 1978, Page 12

There’s many a slip ...

“But it must be true,” protested Granny the other day. “I read it in the newspaper.” Alas, poor Granny. If only she was aware of the tricks and slips which defeat the system and appear in print. Does the reading public, we wonder, take the written word at face value? If it does, the collective mind must be boggling. Take, for instance, this cricketing item from the old “Star Sports”:— “Sydenham gave West 81 min to score 170 and they coasted home with six' minutes to spare and

five wickets in hand.” Or this rugby snippet from the Christchurch

“Today the team will be

without the boot of the full-back, S. C. Murray (unavailable because of a liver injury).” Then there is the type of though t-provoking prose which crops up occasionally in “The Press.” One writer produced an introductory paragraph which read: “What makes grown men thrash around remote country roads in the middle of the night in high powered cars?” From the prolific pen of one of his colleagues came this sentence in a story about a sports champion:—

“He is getting married in two weeks, and will probably not get down to business until he returns from his honeymoon.”

Even the Press Association is not above reproach. Once it referred to a prominent cricket fast bowler, Andy Roberts, as a “West Indies spaceman.”

We wonder whether the “New Zeland Herald” subeditor who put up this heading over four columns on a Davis Cup story had his tongue in his cheek or was feeling drowsy after a hard week-end. “Australians Prepare To Sweep Court,” the heading screamed. And in a smaller type face underneath was “Parun Stands in Way.”

Back to “The Press” sports pages:— “Giacomo Agostini thrilled the 100,000 crowd at the Paul Ricard circuit by hurtling

through the field after his Yamaha failed td start.” Not forgetting the “Star”:— “The All Blacks duty boys have the task of keeping other players in touch with the day’s movements and making sure that no-one is ate.” A rugby correspondent on the “Star Sports” once filed this paragraph:— “Marlborough forwards Ray Sutherland, Schultz and Lowe combined well in a good passing move which took play to Buller’s 25, where they were caught off-side. Tinetti missed with the rather difficult kick.” Tinetti, it must be explained, was the Buller full-back. He could scarcely see the goal-posts from that position.

Items such as that one usually can be laughed off over a foaming tankard. But it was the bosses who were foaming on “The Southland Times” a few years ago when a list of sports club officials were printed under the heading, “Enwood Tennis Officers Called Chickenfeed.” But probably the loudest guffaws produced by a newspaper error in Invercargill in those days came after F.D., a racing reporter, included a certain horse in his selections for a Wyndham meeting in “The Southland News.” The horse had died the day before, and everyone

took great delight in telling the reporter he had picked “a dead cert.” One rugby writer placed himself on a pedestal with Confucius with some irrefutable logic in a report on an All Black trial in Wellington. “Kirkpatrick was brought back into much of the play in the tight,” he wrote. “This meant that he was unable to shine out in the open.”

And he followed that one with an even more overwhelming effort: “Least fortunate of all were those who were on the verge of selection and just missed out. They are the men the All Blacks should thank the most. Without their help, the All Blacks could never have become All Blacks.” That was reminiscent of an offering from a prominent golf professional, writing for a New Zealand newspaper on a big tournament in Britain. “Gary Player was there in his usual self, feeling very good and, in fact, as always feeling better than he has ever before,” he wrote. “A few days before the tournament he was hitting the ball better than I have ever seen him hit it, but then again you can’t hit it well all the time can you?”

It is a lot easier to fall into error when you are talking live into a microphone. Various commentators will vouch for

that, such as the one who proclaimed that “Tremain and Graham were the best of the flankers for New Zealand” or one of his rugby colleagues who blurted out, “only in the last few minutes did the Junior Wallabies look like scoring, and then really they didn’t.” But although there have been many remarks to the contrary, it is not just sports reports that bristle with errors, unintentional or otherwise. This one is from a court report in “The Press”:— “In court he said he told the police he had gone to relieve himself. A check was made of the area from which the defendant had come and a large screwdriver was found.”

Pyne Gould Guinness, Ltd, had occasion to advertise with the same popular morning daily for a single shepherd for a station near Blenheim. After it had passed through the system, the advertisement declared that it was a well-paid position, “with good loving conditions.” The gremlins in the composing rooms occasionally strike with devastating effect. Two transposed lines in a report from London led to this shattering item:— “The 24-year-old Mark was asked how he felt about asking Prince Elizabeth if he could marry Philip, husband of Queen

their daughter. ‘I was petrified’ Lieutenant Phillips replied.”

And no wonder. Another classic came from “The Southland Times.” The then Governor General of New Zealand, Sir Cyril Newell, said when taking up his appointment that he intended to visit every nook and cranny in the country. A mischievous linotype operator set this line as “every cook and granny,” which got him into hot water with his employer. But Sir Cyril was amused, and when his term was over he remarked that he believed he really had met every cook and granny in the country. Finally, mention must be made of a very important person, the news editor, who has the task of composing those big, bold billboard headlines. But even he sometimes reaches a state where his left hand is working independently of his right. One day in 1947, the "Southern Cross,” a now defunct Labour daily, had two main front page stories — the end of meat rationing in New Zealand, and the murder of an old woman on Mount Victoria. The billboard read:—

•‘WOMAN’S BODY FOUND ON MT VICTORIA”

“MEAT RATIONLNG ENDS”