On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:

the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?
--
Thoss

"thoss" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:
the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

I can't think of any roads near me with missing apostrophes, but there's a
Mañana Road near me, and the city and post office both write it as "Manana
Rd" to keep things simple (though it's "Mañana Rd" on highway signs).

S

--
Stephen Sprunk "Stupid people surround themselves with smart
CCIE #3723 people. Smart people surround themselves with
K5SSS smart people who disagree with them." --Aaron Sorkin


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Stephen Sprunk wrote:
"thoss" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 wrote:
the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs

Why?

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

I can't think of any roads near me with missing apostrophes, but there's a
Mañana Road near me, and the city and post office both write it as "Manana
Rd" to keep things simple (though it's "Mañana Rd" on highway signs).

S

--
Stephen Sprunk "Stupid people surround themselves with smart
CCIE #3723 people. Smart people surround themselves with
K5SSS smart people who disagree with them." --Aaron Sorkin


--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

There is a road through Beverly Hills, its name is spelt variously
"Cañon Drive" and "Canon Drive".

Adrian.

On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 Stephen Sprunk wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make
signs and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St.
John's" becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

Well, the first change is welcome because your original is wrong IMHO.
To quote the Concise Oxford Dictionary "Abbreviations are made chiefly
in two ways....(2)Some portion of the middle of the word is dropped out,
the first and last letter being retained...the writing of a full stop at
the end of these, though now usual, is to be deprecated....The method
adopted in the following list is to omit the otiose full stop".
--
Thoss

In article "Stephen Sprunk" writes:
....
In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes).

As far as I know in British English there is no full stop following an
abbreviation if the last letter of the abbreviation is also the last
letter of the complete word. (This is different in US English.)
--
dik t. winter, cwi, kruislaan 413, 1098 sj amsterdam, nederland, +31205924131
home: bovenover 215, 1025 jn amsterdam, nederland; http://www.cwi.nl/~dik/

On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 14:27:40 -0500, "Stephen Sprunk"
wrote:

In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

Sorry - I've had technical problems, so am following this up very
late, but have also observed a lot of punctuation on signs.

Removing punctuation certainly isn't the policy on London Underground
signage. In the new Western ticket hall at King's Cross the signs
refer consistently to 'King's Cross' and 'St. Pancras' even though, as
discussed elsewhere in the thread, it would be more usual to write 'St
Pancras' without a full-stop in British English at least.
Incidentally 'St Pancras' is both the form used on most of the main
line station signage and the form that I would normally use in
writing.

As it happens, since this thread started, I drove past a well-known
posh restaurant just outside Oxford, and noted signs to it as 'Le
Manoir au Quat' saisons' *with* the apostrophe on after 'quat'. These
were standard British road signs with the brown background used for
tourist attractions and the like, and again the convention appears to
be to include punctuation on these signs

Martin

Stephen Sprunk wrote:
In general, all punctuation and diacritical marks are dropped to make signs
and addresses as easy to read/write as possible. Therefore "St. John's"
becomes "St Johns" (notice the two changes). At least where English is the
common language; I assume in languages where accents and such are used more
frequently, signmakers are more tolerant of them

Melbourne has a laneway named after Australian rock band AC/DC (where
the slash is generally written as a lightning bolt). But slashes -- let
alone lightning bolts -- aren't permitted in Melbourne City Council
street names, so it's "ACDC Lane".

Pic of the sign he
http://www.danielbowen.com/2004/10/22/ac-dc/

Regards,

Daniel

wrote:
Tristán White wrote:

The roundels are wrong.

His name is John, not Johns.

Therefore, the apostrophe HAS to go between the n and the s. Any other
signage is the product of illiterate designers.

JOHN'S

MARTIN'S




In the case of plural nouns, the apostrophe always goes afterwards. So

SPANIARDS' INN
if it refers to more than one Spaniard, or else

SPANIARD'S INN


Where there is some discussion is if the given name already ends with S.

Eg JAMES'S PALACE
or JAMES' PALACE

But never JAMES PALACE

The official line is, certainly as far as the University of London is
concerned where I did my studies and I am a sessional lecturer:

If it's Greek, it's always S'

If it's not, it's up to the individual as long as he or she is
consistent throughout.

Therefore, always Achilles' heel, Eros' statue, Nikolaidis' penalty
shot, Stavros' kebab house, Bacchus' wine, Androcles' lion, but if it's
not Greek, you can say James's Square or James' Square as long as it's
consistent throughout.


Good post, but, I believe the normal English grammar rules for
apostrophes are generally dropped on street name signs. Therefore if a
subway station is named after a street it may be appropriate for its
name to be spelt the same way.

PedantGrecian is generally a more pleasing way to describe things
appertaining to the country Greece, than Greek./pedant

Adrian.


WRONG !!!

"Johns" is a perfectly good name. A little rare, but not as much as you
think. I know two men with first names of "Johns" not "John" not
"John's" and then there is Johns Hopkins Universty - JOHNS.

On 26 Jun 2006 10:13:51 -0700, wrote:


Tristán White wrote:
The roundels are wrong.

His name is John, not Johns.

Therefore, the apostrophe HAS to go between the n and the s. Any other
signage is the product of illiterate designers.

JOHN'S

MARTIN'S




In the case of plural nouns, the apostrophe always goes afterwards. So

SPANIARDS' INN
if it refers to more than one Spaniard, or else

SPANIARD'S INN


Where there is some discussion is if the given name already ends with S.

Eg JAMES'S PALACE
or JAMES' PALACE

But never JAMES PALACE



The official line is, certainly as far as the University of London is


The name is derived from the Saint or Saints (there being two of
them), reference to any other John being irrelevent. Generally as in
French,when writing in majescules, such technical drama as punctuation
is not only unnecessary but not easily read by those hard of hearing,
thinking or seeing. people other than car drivers may also find
difficulty as grammar has not been taught in UK for a very long time.

wrote:

Where there is some discussion is if the given name already ends with S.

Eg JAMES'S PALACE
or JAMES' PALACE

But never JAMES PALACE

Can't agree on that. It's a palace or court named for St. James,
not possessed by St. James. Apostrophe indicates possession.
Ambassadors to Britain are appointed to the Court of Saint James, not
Saint James' Court. However, the official royal website calls the
palace, St. James's Palace.

The irony is that St. James was supposedly buried in Compostela, Spain,
and is one of the patron saints of Spain. In Spanish, he has
a special name, "Santiago". You'd think after defeating the
Spanish Armada, the royal house might have thought about renaming
the palace, huh?


--
Ned Carlson
SW side of Chicago, USA
www.tubezone.net