Writing obituaries was not the best job at a newspaper, but it was an important one. I learned to write them from the late Gloria Shafer at the
Battle Creek Enquirer. You did not screw up an obituary, she stressed -- it was usually the last thing written about someone. To that end, she wrote her own, long before she died - that way she knew it was correct.
I should have guessed that one of the newspapers I worked for -- the one in my hometown, no less -- would get it wrong. They spelled my name wrong in my little brother's obituary -- and I was working there at the time!
Here's the one they goofed up today.
