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Yesterday's Xchange column inadvertently referred to the website for gay Melbourne hotel Xchange instead of the email address featured below. The Herald apologises for any embarrassment or loss of reputation this may have caused to both the hotel and our readers.
FYI "Xchange" is a business column.
In a Sept. 6 Tempo section story on
the Chicago River, mention was made of a cholera epidemic in 1885.
Similar mentions were made in the Sept. 6 RedEye edition, a Tribune
Magazine article on March 21, 2004, and in a Metro section story in
1997 (this sentence as published has been corrected in this text). An
1885 epidemic also is cited on a Friends of the River Web site and on a
UIC site. All seem to be the result of what Libby Hill, author of "The
Chicago River," calls an "urban legend." Tribune archives and public
health records do not note such an occurrence, and the number of
purported deaths--80,000 to 90,000--would have been far too many not to
have been noted. Hill is now researching the origin of this epidemic
that wasn't.
Link
In a Sept. 28 story about the Detroit Police Department seeking to buy an armored urban assault vehicle, The Associated Press reported erroneously that the department wants the 10-wheeled vehicle called "The General." The department hopes to purchase a six-wheeled vehicle called "The Commander."
The Sept. 26 Style review of a Madeleine Peyroux performance
incorrectly said that her record label hired a private investigator in
August because it could not locate the artist. Peyroux was not missing
and the fabricated story was circulated by a publicist in Britain,
according to an executive with her U.S. record label.
SHORT-SELLERS sell borrowed stock, hoping
that the stock price will drop and they can return the loan and pocket
the price difference as profit. Tuesday's Tracking the Numbers column
mischaracterized the stock involved in a short sale as "barred" stock. Link
Maybe the Journal got distracted by the launch of its lifestyle-heavy weekend edition. Oh, wait:
THE RECIPE for herbed ricotta, Swiss chard and potato torta that appeared in Saturday's Pursuits section omitted a step. The 1½ cups of shredded pork should be added with the onion, chard and potatoes.
In stories Sept. 23-24 about Pfc. Lynndie England's military trial in the Abu Ghraib prison abuse case, The Associated Press incorrectly quoted a psychologist's testimony. Dr. Xavier Amador testified that Pvt. Charles Graner Jr. acted as England's "social compass," not as her "social accomplice."
Clarence Cavalcante, 19, who was killed in
a car accident Sunday in Westmoreland County, graduated from Mount
Pleasant High School in 2004, not 1995 as stated in a story in Sept.
27, 2005 editions. In addition, a quote attributed to Clarence
Cavalcante in a box accompanying the story should have been attributed
to Chief Duane Hutter of the Kecksburg Volunteer Fire Department.
Link
MICHAEL BROWN'S DREW a sharp response from
Rep. William Jefferson (D., La.). In the initial version of the 11 a.m.
Storm News Tracker item, Mr. Jefferson's name was incorrectly given as
Jefferson Davis. Link
Wondering what's with our headline? Go here. But, more importantly, what's with the first sentence in this correction?
The Times ran an article on Tuesday that claimed to have unearthed a "tantalizing discussion" offering insight into how Judge Roberts might rule on cases involving libel and/or the press. Its basis was a recently-released memorandum written by Judge Roberts during his time as a lawyer in the Reagan administration. Except he didn't write it. So the Times ran this correction:
An article yesterday about Judge John G. Roberts Jr.'s views on libel law attributed a critique of a Supreme Court decision to him erroneously. Mr. Roberts did criticize the decision, New York Times v. Sullivan, in a 1985 memorandum. But a separate unsigned 30-page critique that was among the papers released from his years as a lawyer in the Reagan administration was not his; it was written by Bruce Fein, who was general counsel for the Federal Communications Commission in the Reagan administration. A corrective article appears today, here.
Publishing a corrective article was the right call, and it appears the Times also made an effort to place the corrective piece in the same location as the original. Also the right call. Editor & Publisher has a good story on this mistake. Of note is some background on the Times' policy of running corrective articles. The article says it came into existence in 1999 and 43 corrective stories have been published since then. From E&P:
Times spokesman Toby Usnik told E&P the paper was informed of the error after receiving calls from both the White House and Fein on Tuesday. He said the decision to run an article that went beyond the usual correction page note was prompted by a policy adopted in 1999 that requires "printing an entire replacement article inside the paper if the original was centrally undermined by an error." At least 43 such corrective articles have run since that policy went into effect.
"We thought that a corrective of an error so basic ought to be prominent in the paper, in approximately the same position as the original article," Usnik added in an e-mail to E&P.
...The correction did not explain if the paper took further efforts to authenticate the memo prior to the original story, saying only that "people quoted in the article discussed the Fein memorandum, provided to them by a reporter, on the assumption that it had been written by Judge Roberts."
A headline on a Metro section Page 1
story Sept. 18 incorrectly described the challenges faced by Donald
Trump's Chicago tower as "setbacks."
Link
