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David K. Israel
Daft Dave Debut
by David K. Israel - March 29, 2007 - 7:11 AM

dd.jpgI’m sooOOOoooo excited to introduce you all to Daft Dave, a new feature I’ve been thinking about for some time. The basic idea of Daft Dave is this: here at the _floss, we pride ourselves on being smart, right? Of course, we also screw up now and again, and every week you guys—our even-smarter-than-us loyal readers—prove it by offering up corrections and pointing out egregious errors in the comments.

Sure, as a blogger on a site like this, it’s fun to show off, but perhaps even more fun for you all to prove we don’t always have our facts straight, or our grammar correct, or our punctuation, or spelling, or our links are dead, or… the list goes on.

On such days, when I’m the guilty party, I feel rather daft. Like, how could I have missed/forgotten/not known THAT? Smart, witty David feels more like Daft Dave, which got me thinking… what if I make the mistakes right upfront and let you guys fix ‘em in a recurring feature?

So welcome to Daft Dave’s debut. Today I messed up Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg Address from 1764, er, I mean 1863, of course.

First person to point them all out gets serious Daft Dave Debut bragging rights!

I’m not going to tell you how many mistakes I made copying the 271 word speech into this post, but there are some typos, as well as two words that got switched around. Remember, as with all our contests: no cheating, no consulting books, texts, reference guides or Internet searches, okay? Go to it after the jump… And next week Daft Dave will have some incorrect facts for you to correct.

lincoln.gifFour score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the preposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing weather that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hollow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did hear. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vein — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government for the people, by the people, of the people, shall not parish from the earth.

Comments (7)
  1. Ok Dave, ‘hears’ my shot at it (no pun…)

    Preposition should be proposition
    weather should be whether
    hollow should be hallow
    hear should be here
    vein should be vain

  2. preposition-proposition
    weather-whether
    hear-here
    for the people, by the people, of the people, shall not parish from the earth-
    -of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

  3. Fun new feature!
    Here are the things I noticed:

    upon, not on, this continent
    proposition, not preposition
    whether, not weather
    hallow, not hollow
    here, not hear
    vain, not vein
    perish, not parish

    Should “battle-field” be hyphenated? Maybe it was during that time period.

  4. can not should be cannot
    Kristen and Jane got the rest

  5. Two of you have to share the bragging rights, I’m afraid:

    Jane was the first to get most of the typos but Susan came through with the preposition-switch: of and for. Susan also got perish, not parish.

    Mary: As for the cannots, (and have I mentioned that I had a social studies teacher named Ken Knot? for real?) Lincoln wrote “can not” in all the versions I’ve seen.

  6. Even your introduction is Daft:
    “our even-smarter-than-us loyal readers”
    should be “our even-smarter-than-we loyal readers”

  7. In the Warren Harding article, the word before $20,000 should be THAN, rather than THEN. Just thought I’d throw that in.

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