Huckleberries Online

Mine Owner Placed Mystery Press Ad

Posted by DFO

March 9, 2009 1:55 p.m. • 51 comments

The mysterious tabloid discussing the Lake Management Plan that appeared in Saturday’s Press raised a few eyebrows, as much for its lack of information as for what was included in its eight pages. “I thought the Hagadone Press did it,” quipped Bob Hopper, owner of the Bunker Hill Mine in Kellogg. “I paid for it. As it turns out, who wrote and paid for it inadvertently got left out. It was completely an oversight”/Rick Thomas, CDA Press. More here.

Question: All newspapers goof. Do you have a favorite newspaper snafu?

51 comments on this post so far. Add yours!

Bent on March 09 at 1:31 p.m.
In fact, I do….ask Kevin Taylor about a certain cutline under a photo of woman named Liz Cox…
Cabbage Boy on March 09 at 2:03 p.m.
Yes
When the Spokesman Review allowed Mr. Olivera to start blogging.
Cabbage Boy on March 09 at 2:03 p.m.
Forgot the obligatory :) :)
JohnA on March 09 at 2:24 p.m.
“Dewey defeats Truman” is the classic snafu.

BTW, did you know ‘snafu’ is actually an acronym?
tarynahecker on March 09 at 2:29 p.m.
It’s a toss up between the Liz Cox cutline and the Nazi Priest headline.

Or maybe that time I got the levy rate entirely wrong on a school levy story. That was pretty bad, too.
Cabbage Boy on March 09 at 2:54 p.m.
Any beans to be spilled on the Liz Cox cutline?

For those of us not in the know.
JohnA on March 09 at 3:05 p.m.
CB: Any beans to be spilled on the Liz Cox cutline?

I can imagine a thing or two…

Hey, DFO, there’s an idea. How about a reverse cutline contest? You post the cutline and we’ll imagine the picture? :)
Bent on March 09 at 3:06 p.m.
/CB, you better hurry before DFO sees this…

Let’s just say the nightmare of all typos would be a phantom “x” finding itself in the place of the last letter of her first name…
JohnA on March 09 at 3:10 p.m.
Well, Bent, all I can say is it serves her right for hanging onto that name in the first place. What’s wrong with Beth Cox?

BTW, I guessed right…
Sam on March 09 at 3:33 p.m.
My favorite is one about the college newspaper (I guess this is an easy out, since college newspapers are more likely to screw up than the pros, I suppose. Then again, with less staff at dailies … ) designer who put a photo cut line place holder in for a maritime vessel that read “Big ass Spanish boat.”

And that placeholder was never removed, so it ran the next day.
Bent on March 09 at 3:39 p.m.
Years ago, George Ives from NIC told me a story about how the Sentinnel staff ran a cartoon right above a jewelry store ad, and during paste up someone put border tape around the cartoon and the ad making them appear to be one big ad.

The problem was the tag line on the cartoon that said “Dont drink the water fish (breed) in it.” You can use your imagination on that one too…

If memory serves, that one resulted in a successful lawsuit…
Cabbage Boy on March 09 at 3:55 p.m.
So Bent, that cut line on the poor gal made it to printing?

Wow. Hopefully she was a criminal of sort and not some upstanding citizen being awarded a medal of honor.
joebu on March 09 at 4:14 p.m.
The story involving Ms. Cox was a preview of NIC’s
Popcorn Forum symposium plans for the year. I don’t rember whether she was from Agilent, HP, Telect or Avista at the time, but her company was involved in underwriting part of that year’s event. So it was certainly a positive story.

(Funny — my first reaction upon seeing that incorrect name was to double-check my notes, since I was covering the same media event for The Press. I always had the fear of spelling names wrong or typos creeping in, so when I saw a different spelling than mine in the usually-more-correct paper, I initially assumed they got it right and I didn’t. Then I thought about it some more…)
Bent on March 09 at 4:49 p.m.
Funny Joe…and yes, CB, as Joe points out, it was terrible.

It was the first time I ever saw the S-R bypass a correction and completely re-run a full story with photo in the exact same spot the next day with all of the correct information.
Sam on March 09 at 4:57 p.m.
Joe that is insanely hilarious. I almost imagine you sitting at a desk going, “Oh no, I got it wrong! …. waaaaait a minute …”

rofl.
Sam on March 09 at 4:59 p.m.
I’ve been racking my brain to come up with a personally embarrassing correction but I’m having a hard time thinking of one. Could be that daylight savings time is throwing my brain off today. Most of the corrections I’ve ever had to do involve basic crap that is embarrassing in and of itself for having gotten it wrong (like, yes, a name I’ve spelled 30 times before).
Sam on March 09 at 5:03 p.m.
Actually, there was a time when I wrote a feature while at The Argonaut about one of the lawyers representing Duncan, who also teaches at U Idaho, and we accidentally ran a photo of a different lawyer (no idea how it happened). I changed the photo and printed him out a sheet with the story that included his and personally walked it over to his law firm. I felt bad about that.
Sisyphus on March 09 at 5:21 p.m.
“BTW, did you know ‘snafu’ is actually an acronym?”—I certainly did. Its one of my favorites. Its even in the dictionary now.
KevinTaylor on March 09 at 5:27 p.m.
Thanks Bent! I will never drink beers with Hucksters. I will never drink beers with Hucksters. I will never drink beers with Hucksters. I will never drink beers with Hucksters. I will never drink beers with Hucksters. I will never drink beers with Hucksters. and etc.
Bent on March 09 at 5:29 p.m.
Ha! Now, what fun would that be Kevin…
Cindy_H on March 09 at 5:55 p.m.
Kevin: Please amend your statement to “I will never drink brew with Bent.”
After all, some of us do know how to keep our lips sealed ;-)
Sam on March 09 at 7:32 p.m.
Hey now, KT, I hope I’m not lumped in with that mustachioed man in the pic.
Bent on March 09 at 9:32 p.m.
Come on, you guys have to admit that was a Hall of Famer… It deserves the honor it gets here tonight. Hey and don’t shoot the messenger, DFO asked the question.
JohnA on March 09 at 9:51 p.m.
Thanks, Bent, for one of the funniest threads in years.

I still think she should have gone by ‘Beth’. :)
Bent on March 09 at 10:02 p.m.
Agreded JohnA, Beth would be preferable considering the potential. BTW, I thought you were going to take a stab at describing pictures to go with cutlines, no time like the present… You couldn’t ask for more interesting material…

/just sayin’
Sam on March 09 at 10:13 p.m.
Honestly, Bent, I agree. That’s a hilarious story.

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About this blog

D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.