The Printer’s Devil

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I never knew John Bremner, the long-time journalism professor at Kansas University, but over the years, I’ve worked with some of his students.

Those old news dogs, some of who have helped with this site, gave him high marks, which is good enough for me.

Bremner wrote a small booklet on writing headlines called “HTK” — the old backshop printers’ jargon for “head to come.”

It’s one of the best short courses on headline writing there is.

However, it was printed nearly 40 years ago and I doubt that it’s still in print or even available except in dusty corners of second-hand book shelves — where I found my copy.

Headline-writing is fraught with peril for new editors, and even old editors.

If you do it right, your headlines will light up your newspaper in the same way a flashing neon sign lights up a New Mexico desert sky.

If you do it wrong, your efforts will provide material to standup comics, sneering academics and “idiot editor” books.

It can make you look moronic to your readers and even get you sued.

With the desktop publishing programs now available, you don’t have to “beat the count” and try to cram the headline into a one-, two- or three-column space. You write your head until it fits the text box.

That’s not a bad thing. Trying to get the head to fit was a constant source of errors and headline clunkers. It’s also a lot faster. As you know, I believe time is an editor’s enemy and save time whenever you can.

But you still have to write good heads.

Here are a variety of my own ruminations or some of Bremner’s thoughts from HTK:

• Obviously, the most important headline should be at the top of the page and have the largest type.

• Headlines should be short and simple and use active, punchy action verbs whenever possible.

Also be careful of your grammar in heads.

• Keep your selection of headline fonts limited. It looks better — at least to me — and it saves time, always a good thing for an editor.

I would say no more than two different headline fonts, with additional associated typefaces for bold and italic.

• Keep punctuation in a headline to a minimum. No periods except in rare cases. You’ll probably only need commas, apostrophes and semi-colons (to use in place of “and”) and the rare colon. Use single quote marks instead of the regular two-apostrophe quote marks in heads

• Always read the story completely before you write the headline.

This might seem obvious. But when you’re in a hurry, it’s easy to glance at the first couple of lines and slap on a head.

Heads that say the exact opposite of what the story says happens more often than you expect.

• Avoid jokes or horseplay in heads (or even in story slugs).

An editor for the Boston Globe’s opinion page jokingly put a head on an editorial castigating then President Jimmy Carter.

Figuring someone else would catch and replace it, the editor wrote: More mush from the wimp. No one replaced it and it ran, creating a political fire storm.

• Be careful in using abbreviations. Unless the initials are widely known — FDR, JFK, FBI, UFO and in these days of climate change, FEMA — you’ll create an alphabet soup that confuses readers, a sin when headlines are supposed to bring clarity.

Another caveat: In Kansas and I suspect in other states, municipal planners will refer to a planned unit development which they alphabetize as PUD.

As anyone who’s been in the military, pud is also slang for the male member, so avoid the acronym if at all possible.

Then you won’t have a head like the one I saw: “City pulls PUD off the table.”

• Unless it’s a stupid criminal or hypocritical or arrogant politician, never use a headline to make fun of someone local.

• Always try to strike the fine line between clever and “being a comedian.” Especially in headlines, as Mark Twain (or was it Will Rogers) said, “Sharp wit is blunted on dull minds.”

• Never give away the punch line.

Actually you’ll probably never need this advice but it’s still something I’ll mention.

As a reporter there are only two stories I’ve done in which the ending wasn’t given away until the end. It’s an artificial story structure that if it’s done correctly can be a wallop to readers. But it’s hard to pull off.

I’ve tried it twice in 30 years.

The first one, done while was I was feeling my journalistic oats, I completely hashed up.

The second one — about a kid who launched a balloon message that was found two months and 2,000 miles away — I actually pulled off (and I can say they’re difficult to pull off and I did some serious effort trying to make the surprise ending work). I flipped over the paper and read “Balloon found in North Carolina.”

• It’s essential to develop a dirty mind when being a headline writer. That way you’ll avoid embarrassment later.

Bremner’s teaching style was to give students a list of howlers and then tell them to avoid them. Here are some real-life examples from HTK and from examples I’ve seen and committed:

“FEMA probe says rain caused flooding”

“Beauty unveils bust at ceremony”

“Girl is best hoer at county fair”

“Something went wrong in jet crash, experts say”

“Woman dies in Climax” (Climax is small town in southern Kansas.)

“UN: Infant mortality is better”

“Trojans stop Seaman” (This headline, or a version, appears about once every three years in the sports pages of a Kansas newspaper about a northeastern Kansas high school.)

“Stud tires out”

“War dims hope for peace”

“Panda mating fails; Veterinarian takes over”

“British left waffles on Falkland Islands”

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