PART 3

The Visual Side of Editing

CHAPTER

9

Writing Headlines, Titles,
Captions and Blurbs

 

GETTING PEOPLE TO READ

An axiom of the media industry is that to persuade people to read newspapers and magazines, listen to radio, watch television and surf the Web, you first must get their attention. Radio accomplishes this with sound, while television provides a compelling combination of sound and pictures. The print media and the Internet, on the other hand, rely primarily on still photographs and large type to accomplish the same end.

In this chapter, we review the importance of what print journalists call display type—headlines, titles and blurbs—and the words, called captions or cutlines, that accompany still photographs. For the print or Web journalist, these are critical means of drawing an audience.

COPYEDITORS ARE THE MOST READ WRITERS

Newspapers have developed headline writing into an art form. The copy editor who writes compelling heads, as they are called, is a valuable member of the staff. While the copy editor’s first task is to correct and refine copy, as outlined in earlier chapters, a second task is to write a headline that:

• Attracts the reader’s attention.

• Summarizes the story.

• Helps the reader index the contents of the page.

• Depicts the mood of the story.

• Helps set the tone of the newspaper.

• Provides adequate typographic relief.

Although all these functions are important, none is more important than attracting the reader’s attention.

The Laws of Newspaper Readership

We get a much clearer view of the job of a newspaper journalist when we grasp this simple truth: The average reader does not read the average newspaper story. That’s a depressing thought at first—one most newspaper editors don’t want to hear and don’t want to believe. But, unfortunately, it’s true.

The fact is that the average reader reads the newspaper only about 24 minutes a day, according to recent studies. That’s more than the 15 minutes Walter Lippmann estimated readers spent with papers each day early in the 20th century.

But, of course, that 24 minutes is not all spent reading news. Not by a long shot. From that time, we should subtract the minutes spent looking at the classifieds and other advertising, as well as the TV listings, the horoscope, the comics and the bridge column. We should also subtract the time spent reading columns such as Dear Abby and the 60-Minute Gourmet. Some also would suggest subtracting the time spent reading sports scores and obituaries, but to many these are the most important news in the paper.

How much time is left to read the news? Not much. But think about it. Do you read the whole paper word for word? Few people, even journalists, do so. Why should we expect the average reader to spend more time with a newspaper than we do? What almost all newspaper readers do, journalists included, is look at the pictures and graphics and big type—the headlines, captions and blurbs—and use them as both a quick news summary and an index to what we may want to read in depth.

Now here’s the good news: If we accept this as a fact of newspaper life rather than just get depressed about it, we’re in better shape to make better papers.

Another axiom of the newspaper industry is this: The people most likely to read a newspaper story in its entirety are those most likely to find fault with it.

Let’s start with a word of encouragement for reporters—those most likely to find this news disturbing. After all, we’ve just told you that the prize-winning stories you labored to craft and are so proud of probably aren’t read by many of your paper’s subscribers.

If you write a story about a new kidney machine at the local hospital, it doesn’t matter whether Hemingway himself couldn’t have done a better job. The people most likely to read it, aside from your editor and maybe your family and friends, probably work at the hospital or have kidney problems. Those are the same people who likely know more about the subject than you do and who are most likely to find fault with your story.

That’s encouraging? It can be. If you’re in the doldrums about complaints over stories, let that motivate you to be more accurate. Also consider who’s complaining before you let frustration burn you out.

Editors and publishers who pay more and more attention to studies showing low credibility ratings for newspapers should keep that reality in mind—not just as an excuse but also as a part of the problem that now can be more easily tackled because we’ve identified it as such.

Assume the Reader Won’t Read the Story

Let’s turn our attention to page designers and headline writers for whom the implications are particularly strong for our initial observation—that the average reader doesn’t read the average newspaper story. If the average reader is mainly reading just the big type, then a big part of a reader’s impression of the newspaper’s usefulness—and how interesting it is—is determined at the newspaper copy desk, where the headline is written.

That big type is likely to be all a reader will read of a story. As a result, it should be so clear that the reader will feel, and be, informed by reading it alone. Thus, we offer the single-most powerful bit of advice for improving headlines: When you write a headline, assume the reader won’t read the story.

The problem with many heads is that the copy editor has forgotten that he or she had the benefit of having read the story before encountering the headline. The reader does not. Too many headlines by beginners read like vague titles on term papers. That won’t do.

The test is this: After you’ve written a headline, forget you know what the story is about long enough to read the headline and ask yourself whether you have a clear idea of the news from reading just the headline. If the answer is that you don’t, then the headline should be rewritten or the page designer should redesign the story’s space to include a longer headline, a second deck, a blurb or some other display-type device.

Here’s a tip for page designers: You can design pages that will better inform your readers if you recall the advice that newspaper readers are big-type readers. Every bit of big type on a page is another chance to give them additional news they might not otherwise read.

For example, why use an underline (a one-line caption) with a photo when a full cutline (a multiple-line caption) would allow the copy editor to pull some additional information from the story and highlight it? This is especially helpful when the photo is a portrait of someone prominent in the story and the only information the photographer gives you is the person’s name. Allow room to put in a cutline with an interesting quotation that otherwise might remain unread in the body of the story.

And, of course, when you place any story on the page, ask yourself how complicated the story is and whether the headline specs you’re considering will allow enough space to summarize it adequately.

Although the size of type is important to attract attention, and the number of words the designer allows is critical to communication, the most important part of the headline-writing process is crafting a head that says as much as possible.

Good headlines attract the reader’s attention to stories that otherwise may be ignored. The day’s best story may have little or no impact if the headline fails to sell it or attract the reader’s attention. Headlines sell stories in many ways, but often they do so by focusing on how the reader’s life will be affected. For example, if the City Council has approved a city budget of $30 million for the coming year, one approach is to headline the story:

Council approves $30 million budget

Another approach, which does a better job of selling the story, might be this:

City tax rate to remain unchanged

The second approach answers the question the reader is most likely to ask about the council’s action: How will it affect me?

Some headlines attract attention because of the magnitude of the event they address:

Earthquake in algeria kills 20,000

Others attract attention because the headline is clever or unusual:

Hunger pangs

Thief finds sandwich goodies,

wine provide appetizing loot

Each story requires a different approach, and the headline writer who is able to find the correct one to attract the reader’s attention is a valued member of the newspaper’s staff.

Most headlines that appear over news stories are designed to inform, not entertain, so the headline that simply summarizes the story as concisely and accurately as possible is the bread and butter of the headline writer:

U.S., China to sign major grain deal

Such headlines seldom win prizes for originality or prompt readers to write letters of praise. But a newspaper full of headlines that get right to the point is a newspaper that is easy to read. The reader knows what the story is about and can make an intelligent decision about whether to read more. The headlines summarize the news, much as brief radio newscasts do.

If the headlines on a page do a good job of summarizing the stories, the editors have created for their readers a form of index to the page. This also helps readers determine what to read and what to bypass. In one sense, good headlines help readers determine what not to read. Although that may seem counterproductive to the newspaper’s objectives, it is realistic to recognize that readers will partake of only a small percentage of the newspaper’s offerings. Newspapers help by providing a choice of fare, much as supermarket managers offer their customers various brands of green beans. That may not be an appealing comparison to those who view newspapers as entities above that sort of thing, but it is realistic. To ignore that is a mistake.

The headline also sets the mood for the story. The straightforward news headline indicates that the story it accompanies is a serious one. Similarly, a headline above a how-to-do-it story should reflect the story’s content:

It’s easy to save by regularly changing your car’s oil

Setting the mood is even more important when writing headlines for humorous stories. One newspaper hurt readership of a bright story during the streaking craze by using a straight headline:

Judge lectures streaker

The story was a humorous account of the court appearance of a group of college students who had run across a softball diamond in the nude. In the second edition, the headline writer did a much better job:

Streaker gets the pitch
It’s a whole nude ball game

The mood was set for the reader to enjoy the story.

Headlines probably reveal as much about the tone, or character, of a newspaper as anything it contains. If the top story on the front page is headlined Cops seek lover in ax murder and the second story carries the headline Britney flips over new beau, there can be little doubt about the nature of the publication. Serious tones, as well as sensational ones, can be set with headlines.

Finally, headlines provide typographic relief (see Figure 9-1). They separate stories on the page and relieve the tedium that would exist with masses of text-sized type.

The Reader’s Favorite Newspaper

All the jokes about USA Todays short-article, fast-food journalism aside, that newspaper could teach even The New York Times a thing or two about being informative. That’s because USA Today, second only to The Wall Street Journal in circulation among U.S. newspapers, is probably most in tune with how people actually read, not how journalists think they should.

In an ideal world, everyone would have the time to read in-depth articles about everything. But that’s not the world in which readers live. Readers skim the headlines because they don’t have time to read more than the articles of particular interest to them.

When we as journalists say The New York Times is the standard for journalistic excellence—as in many ways it is—we are not looking at how readers actually read. A typical Times inside page may have only one or two stories on it because they’re so long and in-depth. But what does the average reader read? The big type. How much information, then, did the reader really get from that page?

Compare a Times inside page with a typical inside page in USA Today, loaded with photos and graphics and numerous small stories. More stories means more items can be covered in the same amount of space with a larger array of big type. The average reader probably spends more time reading the average page of USA Today than the average page of The New York Times. That reader will, in turn, be more informed on a greater number of topics.

We’re not suggesting that The New York Times change what it does. For one thing, the average Times reader is probably an atypical newspaper reader—one who buys The Times for the greater depth it offers compared with the alternatives. But most of us can better serve our readers—actually better inform them and keep them more interested—if we put together newspapers in a way that takes into account how most people actually read.

Shorter Stories—And More of Them

If we take the ideas outlined above and apply them to our local paper, it clearly would make sense for us to run shorter stories and more of them. We’re not ruling out occasional lengthy, in-depth pieces. Readers should get these, too, but they should probably be limited to one per open page. It’s unrealistic to think readers will read much more than that.

Despite that, it sometimes seems that reporters think every planning and zoning committee meeting is worth 15 to 20 inches of space or more. When papers run all these lengthy stories, some stories are held until they are less timely or are squeezed out of the newspaper altogether. Reporters’ efforts are wasted, and the readers are more poorly informed.

THE HEADLINE-WRITING PROCESS

Readers read the headline first, then the story. Copy editors work in reverse; they first read the story, then write the headline. This often leads to confusing heads because copy editors mistakenly assume that if readers will only read the story they will understand what the headline is trying to convey. Except in rare cases deliberately designed to tease the reader, the headline must be instantly clear. In most cases, the reader will not read a story simply to find out what the headline means.

Headline writing, then, involves two critical steps:

• Selecting which details to use.

• Phrasing them properly within the space available.

The copy editor exercises editorial judgment in completing the first step in the process. Most use the keyword method in which the copy editor asks: Which words must be included in the headline to convey to the reader the meaning of the story? In its simplest form, this involves answering the question: Who does what? Thus, most good headlines, like all good sentences, have a subject and predicate, and usually a direct object:

Tornado strikes Jonesboro

That done, the copy editor tries to make the headline fit. Synonyms may be necessary to shorten the phrase, and more concise verbs may help:

Twister rips Jonesboro

That, in simplified form, is the essence of headline writing. But it is seldom that easy. All newspapers have rules to define the limits of what is acceptable, and consideration must be given to such factors as the width of the column and the width of the characters in the typeface to be used. In the sections that follow, the complexity of headline writing will become apparent. Through it all, however, it may be useful to keep in mind the two critical steps previously outlined.

Understanding Headline Orders

Traditionally, the instructions for headlines are written as three numbers separated by hyphens. Here are four examples: 1-24-3, 3-36-2, 4-48-1, 6-60-1. The first number in a headline order is the number of columns the headline will cover; the second is the point size of the headline (its height in points measured from the bottom of a descender like g to the top of an ascender like h); and the third is the number of lines in the headline. So, a 1-24-3 headline is one column wide, 24-point type, three lines long.

Although this is less important to understand when headlines are written right into InDesign pages, newspapers still refer to headline sizes this way. Think of it as a shorthand way of talking about headline sizes within the office.

A note on print measurements: In publishing and printing, we don’t measure in inches or centimeters but in picas and points. There are 12 points in a pica and 6 picas (or 72 points) in an inch.

Traditionally, graphic elements and column widths are measured in picas and points, but the height of type is measured just in points. So, we’d say a headline is 36 points (half an inch tall) but a photograph is 38.6 picas wide and 24.6 picas deep.

By the way, 38.6 (read as 38 point 6) means 38½ picas. Why? The point is not a decimal point but a dividing mark between picas and points. The photograph referred to is 38 picas and 6 points wide—or, since there are 12 points in one pica, 38½ picas. In many design programs, 38 picas 6 points would be written 38p6. (In so-called new math terms, we are in base 12, not base 10.)

It will save you time writing headlines if you first visualize their size so you’ll have an idea about how much to write and where to break lines. It’s easy to “see” the number of columns and lines, but visualizing the point size may be hard at first. Just remember that 72 points equal an inch, so 54 points would be three-fourths of an inch, 48 would be two-thirds of an inch, 36 half an inch, 24 one-third of an inch and 18 one-fourth of an inch. Other point sizes can be visualized like this: 60 would be between three-fourths of an inch and an inch tall, 30 would be between one-third and one-half inch tall.

Headline Terminology

Copy editors have various terms for different kinds of headlines so that editors doing the design can tell copy editors editing the stories and writing the headlines exactly what they want. Here are the terms you should know:

Main head. If there’s only one headline over a story, it’s usually just called the headline. But if there is more than one, the headline that makes the main point is the main head. The main head may typically have between one and three or four lines.

Second deck. If the story has more than one headline, the second deck adds additional details or a different angle beyond what’s said in the main headline. A second deck may be one to four lines long. Don’t confuse a second deck with merely a second line of the main head. Here are some differences:

• The second deck will be a sentence of its own and not simply a continuation of a sentence in the main head.

• The second deck will be in a lighter typeface than the main head and at some papers will be italic.

• The second deck will be either half the point size of the main head or the next larger standard point size above half. (The standard head sizes are 14, 18, 24, 30, 36, 42, 48, 54, 60, 72, 90 and 96.) So, a second deck under a 48-point head would be either 24 or 30 points. Example:

This is a main head

This is a second deck beneath the main one

Hammer. A hammer is a label head, typically one to three words long, above a main head. It’s used mainly with features. When a story has a hammer, the hammer is in bold type, and for once the main head is in lighter, smaller type. When you have a hammer, the main head is either half the point size of the hammer or is the next larger standard point size above half. The hammer itself should not be longer than half the width of the main head. Example:

Hammer

Here’s the main head beneath the hammer

Kicker. Like a hammer, a kicker is a label head (but of up to about five words) above a main head. But with a kicker, the main head is the bold one while the kicker is half the point size (or the next standard size above half) of the main head and in lighter type. At some papers, a kicker is italic or underlined, or some combination of lighter, italic and underlines. Kickers are much less common today than hammers because people tend to read type from biggest to smallest, so a kicker tends to be read after the main head—not what the designer wants—and leads people’s eyes away from the story. Example:

This is a kicker up here

Here’s the main head

Headline Mechanics

There are a few headline conventions with which all headline writers must be familiar. Here, by category, are a few must-know items about the mechanics of crafting a newspaper headline:

PUNCTUATION

• Most editors write downstyle headlines in which only the first word of the headline and other proper names are capitalized.

• Don’t put a period at the end of a sentence unless your newspaper style calls for a period at the end of a conversational deck.

• If you have two sentences within one headline, separate them with a semicolon (and do not capitalize the first word of the second sentence). A semicolon should not be used in a headline unless both what precedes and follows are complete sentences with subjects and predicates.

• Use single rather than double quotation marks.

• A comma is used in place of the word and.

• Attribution is best shown with the word says, but it is often shown with a colon instead. If a colon is used, capitalize the first word that follows if it begins an independent clause. A third way to show attribution, a way that is the least desirable, is with a dash at the end of the thought, followed by the name of the person who said it. But beware of confusing headlines like this one:

Cause for AIDS found — scientists

GRAMMAR

• Except for hammers, kickers, catchlines (one or two words in headline type accompanying a photograph) and a few magazine-style titles, headlines should be complete sentences but with the articles and adjectives missing.

• Write in present tense about events that have happened since the last day’s newspaper.

• Past tense, usually used for events in a more distant past, is rarely used. Example:
Pearl Harbor was ‘no picnic,’ witness recalls

• Future is shown by changing will to to. Example:
City Council to discuss sewer bonds

• Write in active voice.

• Eliminate articles (a, an, the) and to be verbs.

LINE BREAKS

More and more newspapers are ignoring headline splits, but it’s better to learn to write heads without them; split heads are easier to write. So, for our purposes:

• Multiple-line headlines should break at logical places—at pauses between natural breath units.

• If you have a literary background, think of multiple-line headlines as little poems, and put the line breaks only where they would come in a poem.

• Don’t split modifiers from the word they modify.

• Don’t split a prepositional phrase over two lines.

• Don’t split the parts of an infinitive over two lines.

• Some leeway is permitted in one-column heads—but only as a last resort. Typically, this involves modifiers (prepositional phrases would still not usually be split).

ABBREVIATIONS

• Never abbreviate days of the week.

• Never abbreviate months unless followed by a date.

• Most newspapers allow abbreviations for states without a city name preceding.

• Never abbreviate months or states that AP does not.

• Typically, it is permissible to abbreviate these cities: Kansas City as K.C., Los Angeles as L.A. and New York as N.Y.

• Never abbreviate a person’s name (Wm. F. Buckley, J. Jones).

• Do not eliminate the in front of Rev.

• Most newspapers will let you use a numeral for a number less than 10.

• You may use a percent sign (%) for the word percent.

• As in text, you may abbreviate any headline reference for U.S., U.N., CIA or a university commonly known to readers (M.U., USC, etc.).

• Some, but probably not most, newspapers will let you abbreviate county as Co. or department as Dept. if the rest of the name is present.

HOW TO WRITE THE HEADLINE

Some editors leave the wire service’s suggested headline on top of the story to help them get started. If you do this, don’t rely too heavily on it or your headline will sound too much like those of other papers. But it does make a good starting point, a check that you’ve understood the story and a fallback if you’re stuck.

Start by writing your ideal head for the story—what you’d like to say if space were no object. Then try to fit it into the space you have. Cut the head to its essentials if it’s too long. If it’s too short, add more information. To improve the fit, you can also simply pick synonyms that say the same thing in a shorter or longer space (see Figure 9-2).

Some editors find it useful to jot down key words from the story that need to be in the headline. Then they build the head around these key words.

Headlines That Tell

Here are some tips on writing informative headlines:

• Remember that the headline and other big type may be all the reader will read, so get in the key words and be as specific as possible in presenting the news.

• After you’ve written a headline, forget for a moment what you’ve read in the story. Would you have a clear understanding of the news just from reading the big type (headlines, blurbs and captions)? If not, rewrite the head. Example:

No: Jury hears how man was slain

Yes: Victim slain with his own gun

• Make sure the headline is accurate—don’t exaggerate or mislead. Reread the story to make sure.

• Try to match the tone of the story in the headline. A light story demands a light head. A tragic story should not have a head that is a pun.

• Don’t editorialize. Attribute all controversial statements. Make sure the headline over a news story is neutral and fair.

• Get information from the top, but don’t repeat the lead or give away a punch line or ending. If the best headline information really is down further, consider moving that information up.

• Be conversational and clear. Make the language vivid, and appeal to the reader. Don’t write a headline in the negative (using not)—it’s harder to grasp quickly. Don’t try to get more than one idea in a deck, or things can get confusing.

• Don’t overabbreviate. Use only abbreviations everyone knows: CIA, FBI, UFO. Examples of unacceptable abbreviations: DOS for Department of State, FD for Fire Department.

• Don’t use obscure names or terms in the headline.

• Don’t use common last names (Jones or Smith) in a headline. Use a name only if the person is well-known and easily identifiable. The exception, of course, is an obituary.

• Pay special attention to verbs. Write in active, not passive, voice. Try to get a verb in the top line, but don’t start with a verb, or the headline may sound like a command. Likewise, avoid label heads (those without verbs) except in hammers, kickers and catchlines. If a label head is appropriate, beware of nouns that can also be read as verbs because they can introduce double meanings:

Dead cats protest

• Avoid “headlinese” whenever possible: blasts, rips (ridicules); nixes (rejects); solons (lawmakers, Legislature). Reserve, when possible, the old standby headline terms for deadline.

• Don’t pad a line to make it fit. Say something.

• Question heads seldom work. Avoid them unless the point of the story is to raise a question to which it doesn’t present the answer.

• Don’t repeat words in the big type—within a headline, or between heads or captions or blurbs.

• If your paper still uses upstyle or all-cap heads (few do anymore), be especially aware of how some names may be misread:

Right: Chargers may lose Butts for rest of year

Wrong: CHARGERS MAY LOSE BUTTS FOR REST OF YEAR

Headlines That Smell

To the advice above, let’s add more tips based on examples of actual headline bloopers by professionals. Such examples are collected monthly in the back of Columbia Journalism Review and American Journalism Review. Almost every August, the National Lampoon also collects examples in its True Facts issue. You might also like to look at Jay Leno’s collections of headlines, the royalties from which he donates to pediatric AIDS programs and research.

BEWARE OF TYPOS

Poll says that 53% believe media offen make mistakes
Re-electing Lincoln: The battle for the 1964 presidency
Defective show officially starts new TV season
Schools to call for pubic input
Nicaragua sets goal to wipe out literacy
13% of U.S. adults unable read or write English
Are young Americans be getting stupider?
Tribal council to hold June meeting in June
Man booked for wreckless driving
56-year-old man shoots shoots daughter twice
Despite our best efforts, black employment is still rising

AVOID VAGUE HEADLINES THAT SAY NOTHING OR STATE
THE OBVIOUS

City Council to meet
Strike continues in fifth day
School board agrees to discuss education
New bar exam to include test of legal skills
Religion plays major part in the message of Easter
Cold wave linked to temperatures
Researchers call murder a threat to public health
Some students walk, others ride to school
Don’t leave kids alone with molester
Carcinogens cause cancer, book says
8 American men left

BEWARE OF DOUBLE ENTENDRES

After dogs died in heat, should owners have gotten off?
Marijuana issue sent to a joint committee
City Council takes up masturbation
Breaking wind could cut costs
Muggers beat man with empty wallet
Why do we tolerate demeaning gays, women?
Bad coupling cause of fire
Plan to deny welfare to applicants still alive
Textron Inc. makes offer to screw co. stockholders
Spot searches dog bus drivers
Narcolepsy may be more prevalent in women than thought
Tahoe-area man sentenced to 28 years in Calif.
Many who moved to Florida leave after death
High-crime areas said to be safer
Beating witness provides names
Unpaid subway fare led police to murder suspect
Culver police: Shooting victims unhelpful
Police begin campaign to run down jaywalkers
Man executed after long speech
Man admits killing widow to avoid facing death penalty
More judicial fertilizer use advised
Condom Week starts with a cautious bang
Jerk injures neck, wins award
Doctors offer sniper reward
Blind workers eye better wages
Navy jet preparing for air show crashes
Woman off to jail for sex with boys
Stiff opposition expected to casketless funeral plan
Dolls sent to flood homeless
Do-it-yourself pregnancy kit to go on sale
Dr. Tackett gives talk on moon
Mad cow speaker at Arts Center
Aging expert joins university faculty
No dad’s better than abusive one
Dad wants 3 charged for sex with daughter
Prostitutes appeal to pope
Wives kill most spouses in Chicago
Professor of Greek thought dead at 59
Murder suspect gets appointed attorney
Bill to help poor facing early death
Clinton makes domestic violence appeal to men
Teacher strikes idle kids
USA to seek new location
Woman dies after 81 years of marriage
Clinic gives poor free legal help
Giant women’s health study short of volunteers
Senate presses vets’ suits
Lebanon chief limits access to private parts
Potential witness to murder drunk
S. Florida illegal aliens cut in half by new law
ISU revokes doctorate in plagiarism
A promising medical specialty emerges to help torture victims
Jude delays ruling on paddling principal
New drugs may contain AIDS, but not all can afford them
A record walker admits she skipped 1,000 miles
Army focuses on second base in sex probe
Jessica Hahn pooped after giving testimony

BEWARE OF MISPLACED MODIFIERS

Scotland Yard arrests three men carrying explosives and seven others
40,000 at Mass for Polish priest reported killed
Threatened by gun, employees testify

WRITE ACCURATE HEADLINES

The key to ensuring accuracy is close and careful reading of the story. Erroneous head-lines result when the copy editor doesn’t understand the story, infers something that is not in the story, fails to portray the full dimension of the story or fails to shift gears before moving from one story to the next. Some examples:

Minister buried in horse-drawn hearse
(The hearse and horse participated in the funeral procession, but they were not buried with him.)

Cowboys nip Jayhawks 68–66 on buzzer shot
(The lead said that Kansas [the Jayhawks] beat Oklahoma State [the Cowboys] by two points in a Big XII conference basketball game.)

Paducah’s bonding law said hazy
(The details were hazy; the subject of the story was hazy about the details.)

3 in family face charges of fraud
(They were arrested in a fraud investigation, but the charges were perjury)

Black child’s adopted mother fights on
(The child didn’t select the mother; it was the other way around. Make it “adoptive.”)

Do-nothing Congress irks U.S. energy chief
(The spokesman criticized Democrats, not Congress as a whole, and the “do-nothing” charge was limited to oil imports.)

Four held in robbery of piggy bank
(The bank was the loot; the robbery was at a girls’ home.)

White House hints at ceiling on oil spending
(The subject of the story was oil imports.)

DON’T REHASH OLD NEWS

Some stories, like announcements, offer little or no news to invite fresh headlines. Yet, even if the second-day story offers nothing new, the headline cannot be a repetition of the first-day story lead.

Suppose on Monday the story says that Coach Mason will speak at the high school awards dinner. If Mason is prominent, his name can be in the head: Mason to speak at awards dinner. On Thursday comes a follow-up story, again saying that Coach Mason will be the awards dinner speaker. If the headline writer repeats the Monday headline, readers will wonder if they are reading today’s paper. The desk editor will wonder why copy editors won’t keep up with the news. The problem is to find a new element, even a minor one, like this: Tickets available for awards dinner. So the dinner comes off on Friday, as scheduled. If the Saturday headline says Mason speaks at awards dinner, readers learn nothing new. The action is what he said: Mason denounces ‘cry-baby’ athletes. Or if the story lacks newsworthy quotes, another facet of the affair goes into the head: 30 ATHLETES GET AWARDS.

WATCH FOR LIBEL

Because of the strong impression a headline may make on a reader, courts have ruled that a headline may be actionable even though the story under the head is free of libel. Here are a few examples:

Shuberts gouge $1,000 from Klein brothers
‘You were right,’ father tells cop who shot his son
McLane bares old Hickory fraud charges
Doctor kills child
A missing hotel maid being pursued by an irate parent
John R. Brinkley—quack

A wrong name in a headline over a crime story is one way to involve the paper in a libel action. The headline writer, no less than the reporter, must understand that under the U.S. justice system a person is presumed innocent of any crime charged until proved guilty by a jury. Heads that proclaim Kidnapper caught, Blackmailer exposed, Robber arrested or Spy caught have the effect of convicting the suspects (even the innocent) before they have been tried.

If unnamed masked gunmen hold up a liquor store owner and escape with $1,000 in cash, the head may refer to them as “robbers” or “gunmen.” Later, if two men are arrested in connection with the robbery as suspects or are actually charged with the crime, the head cannot refer to them as “robbers” but must use a qualifier: Police question robbery suspects. For the story on the arrest, the headline should say Two arrested in robbery, not Two arrested for robbery. The first is a shortened form of in connection with; the second makes them guilty. Even in may cause trouble. Three women arrested in prostitution should be changed to Three women charged with prostitution.

The lesson should be elementary to anyone in the publishing business, but even carefully edited papers and websites are sometimes guilty of publishing heads that jump to conclusions. This was illustrated in the stories concerning the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Lee Harvey Oswald was branded the assassin even though, technically, he was merely arrested on a charge of murder. In a statement of apology, the managing editor of The New York Times said his paper should not have labeled Oswald an assassin.

In their worst days, newspapers encouraged headline words that defiled: fanged fiend, Sex maniac, Mad-dog killer. Even today, some newspapers permit both reporter and copy editor to use a label that will forever brand the victim. When a 17-year-old boy was convicted of rape and sentenced to 25 to 40 years in the state penitentiary, one newspaper immediately branded him “Denver’s daylight rapist.” Another paper glorified him as “The phantom rapist.” Suppose an appeal reverses the conviction? What erases the stigma put on the youth by the newspaper?

The copy editor who put quotation marks around Honest count in an election story learned to his sorrow that he had committed libel for his paper. The implication of the quotes is that the newspaper doesn’t believe what is being said.

DON’T OVERSTATE

Akin to the inaccurate headline is one that goes beyond the story, fails to give the qualifications contained in the story or confuses facts with speculations. Examples:

DON’T COMMAND THE READER

Headlines that begin with verbs can be read as commands to the reader and should be avoided. A New York City newspaper splashed a 144-point headline over the story of the shooting of Medgar Evers, a civil rights advocate. The head: Slay NAACP leader! Another head may have given the impression that a murder was being planned: Slaying of girl in home considered. In reality, police were trying to determine whether the murder took place in the girl’s house or in a nearby field.

Here are some examples of heads that command:

Save eight from fire
Buy another school site
Arrest 50 pickets in rubber strike
Find 2 bodies, nab suspect
Assassinate U.S. envoy

AVOID EDITORIALIZING

The reporter has ample space to attribute, qualify and provide full description. The copy editor, however, has a limited amount of space in the headline to convey the meaning of the story. As a result, there is a tendency to eliminate necessary attribution or qualification and to use loaded terms such as thugs, cops, yippies and deadbeats to describe the participants. The result is an editorialized headline.

Every word in a headline should be justified by a specific statement within the story. Was the sergeant who led a Marine platoon into a creek, drowning six recruits, drunk? Most headlines said he was, but the story carried the qualification “under the influence of alcohol to an unknown degree.”

Even though the headline reports in essence what the story says, one loaded term will distort the story. If Syria, for reasons it can justify, turns down a compromise plan offered by the U.S. concerning the Golan Heights problem, the head creates a negative attitude among readers when it proclaims Syria spurns U.S. compromise.

It is often difficult to put qualification in heads because of count limitations. But if the lack of qualifications distorts the head, trouble arises. A story explained that a company expected to bid on a project to build a fair exhibit was bowing out of the project because the exhibit’s design was not structurally sound. The headline, without qualification, went too far and brought a sharp protest from the construction company’s president:

Builder quits, calls state World’s Fair exhibit ‘unsound’

AVOID SENSATIONALIZING

Another temptation of the headline writer is to spot a minor, sensational element in the story and use it in the head. A story had to do with the policy of banks in honoring outdated checks. It quoted a bank president as saying, “The bank will take the checks.” In intervening paragraphs, several persons were quoted as having had no trouble cashing their checks. Then in the 11th paragraph was the statement: “A Claymont teacher, who refused to give her name, said she had tried to cash her check last night, and it had been refused.” She was the only person mentioned in the story as having had any difficulty Yet the headline writer grabbed this element and produced a head that did not reflect the story:

State paychecks dated 1990
Can’t cash it,
teacher says

DON’T MISS THE POINT

The process of headline writing begins as soon as a copy editor starts reading the story. If the lead can’t suggest a headline, chances are the lead is weak. If a stronger element appears later in the story, it should be moved closer to the lead.

Although the headline ideally emerges from the lead, and generally occupies the top line (with succeeding lines offering qualifications or other dimensions of the story), it often has to go beyond the lead to portray the full dimensions of the story. When that occurs, the qualifying paragraphs should be moved to a higher position in the story. Example: U.S. company to design spying system for Israel. The lead was qualified. Not until the 15th paragraph was the truth of the head supported. That paragraph should have been moved far up in the story.

The head usually avoids the exact words of the lead. Once is enough for most readers. Lead: “Despite record prices, Americans today are burning more gasoline than ever before, and that casts some doubt on the administration’s policy of using higher prices to deter use.” Headline: Despite record gasoline prices, Americans are burning more fuel. A paraphrase would avoid the repetition: Drivers won’t let record gas prices stop them from burning up fuel. Since the story tended to be interpretive, the head could reflect the mood: Hang the high price of gasoline, just fill ’er up and let ’er roar. Most copy editors try to avoid duplicating the lead, but if doing so provides the clearest possible head, it is a mistake to obfuscate.

DON’T GIVE AWAY THE PUNCH LINE

Some stories are constructed so that the punch line comes at the end, rather than at the beginning. Obviously, if the point of the story is revealed in the headline, the story loses its effectiveness. One story, for example, told of a man who went shopping with his little girl and yielded to her pressure to buy a life-sized doll despite the fact that it cost only $1 less than his weekly salary. That led to an argument with his wife about frivolous spending, and the man left home in a huff. The woman put the child to bed with her doll and went in search of her husband. She found him at a nearby bar, but when they returned home they saw firefighters battling a blaze at their apartment. Firefighters had to restrain the father from trying to rescue the girl. “You wouldn’t be any use in there,” a police officer told him. “Don’t worry, they’ll get her out.” A firefighter, himself a father, climbed a ladder to the bedroom window, and the crowd hushed as he disappeared into the smoke. A few minutes later, coughing and blinking, he climbed down, a blanket-wrapped bundle in his arms. The local newspaper headlined its story with the line that should have been saved for the finish:

Fireman rescues life-size doll
as child dies in flames

Headlines That Sell

A good headline tells the story; a great headline tells it and sells it. Remember, though, that headlines that sell must also tell. Selling is something you do in addition to telling, not in place of it. Here are some techniques to make a headline sell a story by explaining it in a way that is striking:

ALLITERATION

Alliteration is the repetition of sounds. It’s often overused but can still be effective. Alliteration should sound natural or at least make sense.

Crowds cry encore to street-corner Caruso
(about a man who dresses in a tux and sings opera arias on the street for tips)

RHYMES

Rhymes can sometimes work.

Dollars for scholars
(hammer over scholarship story)

The urge to converge
(hammer on a story about business mergers)

BALANCE AND CONTRAST

Examples of this technique are:

They bring new life to old towns
(about remodelers of historic buildings)

Hot pursuit of the common cold

GRAPHIC DEVICES

Graphic devices occasionally work but can be cheesy, too.

Photocopying made easy photocopying made easy
Missing I tt rs in sign puzzl curators at mus um
$port$ and money
It’s a boy, it’s a boy, it’s a girl, it’s a girl: Quadruplets born to local couple

PUNS

This is one of the most-often used headline tricks. In fact, it’s used so much, most editors, if not readers, get tired of it. Not only that, it’s often misused. Still, puns can be effective when they are appropriate to the mood and content of the story. Don’t try to brighten a serious story with an inappropriate one.

No: Mother of all deadbeat dads gets six months in prison
No: Macmassacre! 23 killed in Big Mac attack
(about a mass murder at a McDonald’s)

Yes: Clockmaker puts heart into tickers
Yes: Business picking up for pooper-scooper firm
Yes: Last brew-ha-ha: ‘Cheers’ ends 11-year-run

PUT A TWIST ON THE FAMILIAR

This technique is similar to the pun but specifically involves taking a well-known saying, title or cliché, and playing off it. (We’re indebted to educator and magazine expert Don Ranly for many of these examples.)

Forgive us our press passes
(story about criticism of the press)

‘Tis a pity’ it’s a bore
(review of production of play Tis a Pity She’s a Whore)

Where there’s smoke, there’s ire
(about no-smoking controversy)

Take this job and love it

There’s no business like shoe business
(feature about a shoe-repair shop)

English bathrooms out of the closet
(about British decorating their bathrooms)

LEARN FROM MAGAZINES, TABLOIDS AND USA TODAY

Although these sometimes sensationalize, you can learn from some of them.

• Headlines with personal pronouns such as you or we:

We’re eating out more
(survey story USA Today style)

• Advice headlines:

How to sell your old baseball cards for a fortune
Five ways to flatten your thighs

• Analysis headlines:

Why the U.S. is losing the drug war

• Striking or superlative statements:

The iron woman of softball
(hammer)

Threat of terrorism has rambo quaking
(Sylvester Stallone cancels trip to Europe after terrorism threat)

AVOID “HEADLINESE”

Avoid the words that get overused in headlines and that make them sound alike. Examples of “headlinese” to avoid include: blasts, cops, eyes, gives nod (approves), grill (question), hike, OK’s, probe, raps, row (clash), set, slated. These are all overused.

SPEAK THE LANGUAGE OF THE STORY

Think of words associated with the subject of the story, and use them in the headline to bring the reader into the spirit of the topic:

What a long, strange trip it’s been: Summit marks LSD’s 50th year
After the pomp, tough circumstances
(about poor job prospects for grads)

LET THE STORY SPEAK FOR ITSELF

Sometimes you don’t want to be cute—the story is odd or interesting enough by itself. Stories about dinosaurs, space aliens, diets and medical breakthroughs fit this category. You just need to get the keyword in the headline and people will read it.

Are 33 orgasms a day normal at age 75?
(Sex-advice column)

Man acquitted in mayonnaise slaying case

What To Do If You’re Stuck

Every headline writer has a mental block at one time or another. Here are some tips for when that happens:

• If you can’t get a line to fit, look for synonyms for each individual word in that line that might be longer or shorter as needed. If that doesn’t work, only then should you try rewriting the whole headline with a different approach.

• Look at the suggested head from the wire service, if it’s still atop the story. Maybe that will help you come up with a different idea.

• Ask another editor for help. If neither of you can think of something, ask your superior. If none of you can come up with something, ask that the size or number of lines be changed or that a blurb or second deck be added.

• If you’re having trouble capturing a feature story’s focus, the story itself may need more focus. But if it’s too late to send it back, consider turning a quote from the story into the head. This is an especially helpful technique for a personality profile. But don’t get in the habit of doing this all the time.

• This last idea is sneaky and should be used only as a last resort: If you’re having trouble not repeating a great lead in the headline, consider stealing the great lead for the head, then rewriting the actual lead. But don’t even think of doing this with a local story—only a wire one where the reporter won’t be around to chew you out.

TITLE HEADS IN MAGAZINES

Newspapers have headlines, and magazines have titles. Sometimes they are similar, and sometimes they are not. Carl Riblet Jr., an expert on title and headline writing, suggested that beginners start by listing the titles of all the books they have read. This is to demonstrate that readers can recall titles even if they have forgotten the contents. It also demonstrates the effectiveness of an apt title.

A good title helps sell the story, as illustrated by these originals and the revisions given them by alert book publishers:

Old: Old-Time Legends Together With Sketches, Experimental and Idea

New: The Scarlet Letter

Old: Pencil Sketches of English Society

New: Vanity Fair

Old: The Life and Adventures of a Small-town Doctor
New: Main Street

Old: Alice’s Adventures Underground

New: Alice in Wonderland

Old: Tales of a Country Veterinarian

New: All Things Wise and Wonderful

Typically, a newspaper uses illustrations to focus the readers’ attention on a page. It relies on the headline to lure readers into the story. But in a magazine, the whole page—title, pictures, placement—is designed to stop the readers in their tracks. They may get part of the story from a big dramatic picture before they ever see the title. This combination of elements must make readers say to themselves, “I wonder what this is all about.”

The magazine editor is not confined to a few standardized typefaces for headings. Instead, the editor may select a face that will help depict the mood of the story. Nor is the editor required to put the heading over the story. It may be placed in the middle, at the bottom or on one side of the page.

The heading may occupy the whole page or only part of a page. It may be accented in a reverse plate or in some other manner. It may be overprinted on the illustration. More often, it will be below the illustration rather than above it. Almost invariably it is short, not more than one line. Often, it is a mere tag or teaser. A subtitle, then, gives the details:

Oil from the Heart Tree

An exotic plant from Old China produces
a cash crop for the South

I Can HEAR Again!

This was the moment of joy, the rediscovering
of sound: whispers… rustle of a sheep…
ticking of a clock

The Pleasure of Milking a Cow

Coming to grips with the task at hand
can be a rewarding experience,
especially on cold mornings

In magazines, only a few of the rigid rules that apply to newspaper headlines remain in force. Rules of grammar and style are observed, but almost anything else goes. Magazine title writing is free-form in both style and content.

HEADLINES AND TITLES FOR THE WEB

Almost all of the basic conventions of headline and title writing apply equally to the Web. Typically, news sites follow the conventions of newspaper headline writing, and other sites employ a mixture of headline and title writing. But editors increasingly realize there are significant differences between writing heads for print and websites.

Primary among those differences is the need to craft a Web headline so the story can easily be found by search engines such as Google and Yahoo! Editors call this an SEO (search-engine optimized) headline. Suzanne Levinson, director of site operations for MiamiHerald.com and ElNuevoHerald.com, argues that for several reasons SEO headlines must be different from those that appear in the newspaper or magazine:

• Keywords often are missing in print heads, a fatal flaw in online heads. A print story about a football game, for example, may have a head without Miami or Dolphins, words that are essential if a search engine is to find it. Even when entire texts are indexed, without the requisite keywords the story will rank lower in the list of search results.

• There often is no context for the head. In other words, on the Web there may not be a photo, caption, subhead or section label (national, international, sports, etc.) to help the reader figure out what the story is about. And even if some of those exist, search engines allow readers to drill straight to the story, sometimes without the surrounding context.

• Print headlines often are too long or too short for the Web. As a result, they don’t automatically work on the Internet.

• Print headlines often are written awkwardly to fit space available in the print edition, which might not correspond to the space available online.

• Clever heads for which print editors are known often don’t work on the Web. Website scanners want information and don’t want to be teased.

Levinson argues that readers tend to search for topic and location. Example:

Schools in Miami

If those words aren’t in the headline, there’s a strong possibility the user will never find it. Why is this important? Websites must attract as many readers as possible to become financially viable. Web editors, then, must write headlines that index the news even better than printed publications. Levinson cites examples of headlines from the Miami Herald that were rewritten for the Web:

Print: Ripe for growth

Online: Wine superstore sign of industry’s growth

Print: Divorce was out of the question, husband says

Online: Divorce was never an option, Terry Schiavo’s husband says in new book

Levinson suggests that editing text for the Web is different, too. As an example, she notes that here, when used in the Miami Herald, clearly refers to Miami. But with readers coming directly to a story on MiamiHerald.com from a search engine such as Google or Yahoo!, the reader may not even be aware that he or she is reading an article from Miami. Similarly today may work well in a printed publication for the date of publication; it doesn’t work at all on the Web, where the day of week or date is essential.

Teresa Schmedding, news editor of the Daily Herald in suburban Chicago, agrees with Levinson that the Web demands a different approach. Like Levinson, she warns against cute headlines that tease rather than inform. Says Schmedding, “Studies show that readers do not like headlines that force them to click on something by teasing, but they do like those that help them evaluate whether they want to read.”

Like Levinson and Schmedding, executives nationwide are rethinking how they edit their websites. Increasingly they realize that while the fundamentals of editing and headline writing for print remain, the Web is a different medium that requires new approaches.

BLURBS AND CAPTIONS

Most readers, as we learned earlier, don’t completely read many stories in the newspaper. Instead, they look at the photos, graphics and big type. They use the headlines, captions and blurbs as an index to the news, deciding which stories to read. It’s important, then, that editors try to sneak across as much information as possible in the big type. Readers should feel—and be—informed merely by perusing the paper in their normal way.

So, tell the story as completely as possible in the main head, then use any additional devices available to you—second decks, blurbs or captions—to add as much other important news as possible.

• View second decks, blurbs and captions as opportunities to get across more information to people who won’t be reading the story, as well as hooks to people who might be tempted to read more.

• Put the main idea in the biggest type, the next most important idea in the next biggest type, and so on. Usually, this means the following order: main head, second deck, blurb, caption.

• Don’t repeat information from one graphic element to another. That’s just wasting the opportunity to get across more information.

• Make sure none of the information contradicts information in the other elements or in the story. Especially, make sure the spelling of names is consistent.

• Write in full sentences. Don’t cut articles or to be verbs from blurbs or captions.

• You don’t have to worry about where the lines break with blurbs or captions.

• Learn local style on matters like whether your paper uses single or double quote marks in blurbs and captions.

Blurbs

Blurbs go by different names at different papers—pullouts, pull quotes and so on—but the key thing to remember is that whatever they’re called, they are information in big type that either provides a summary or a sample of the story.

External blurbs are always summary blurbs. They generally come between the headline and the lead of the story, in which case they’re sometimes called read-out blurbs, although they have many other names, as well. Read-out blurbs are similar in function to second decks, but they permit more flexibility and generally greater space to say more.

Sometimes, generally on feature stories, an external blurb may be above the headline, in which case it’s called a read-in blurb because it reads into the headline.

Internal blurbs are always sample blurbs. They are placed somewhere within the story itself, usually with rules above and below them. Most often, they’re used for pull quotes, the most interesting quote or quotes from the story. Sometimes, especially when none of the quotes are that colorful but the page designer has planned for the space, an internal blurb may simply be interesting information from the story rather than a quote.

Captions

Writing photo captions is an art. Here are some tips to remember:

• Don’t waste the opportunity to get across more information. Fill up the space as much as possible and don’t say obvious things like “Janet Hemmings looks on as…”

• Feel free to add information from the story to the cutline if you have extra space. It’s also fine for the cutlines to have information not in the story.

• If there are multiple captions, put the main cutline information under the dominant photo, the one people will look at first.

• Write in present tense. It’s helpful to avoid days or dates in cutlines. This will savoid awkward mixes of present tense with past days.

• When more than one person is pictured, a caption usually names them from left.

There are several kinds of captions:

Nameline. A nameline is a one-line caption under a mugshot and consists only of the person’s name. A nameline under a full-column mugshot will have the person’s first and last name. A nameline under a thumbnail (half-column mug) will have only the person’s last name.

Nameline-underline. Some papers will put a one-line description under a nameline. That’s called a nameline-underline. Example:

Hillary Clinton
Mum on Syrian uprising

Underline. An underline is a one-line caption. Except for when it’s part of a nameline-underline, the underline should be a full sentence and have a period or question mark at the end. An underline should never be less than half the space width that was allowed for it, and ideally, it should fill the line.

Cutline. A cutline is a multiline caption and is used to provide more information than a mere underline would allow. A cutline in one or two columns may be any number of lines long. In three columns or more, a cutline is usually divided into two or more wraps (such as two wide columns of type under a three-column photo), and each column should have an even number of lines so the wraps are equally long.

Catchline. A catchline is a label head (like a hammer) over the cutline of a stand-alone photo (a photo with no story other than the information in the cutline). It’s typically one to three words.

Publications and websites that do a great job of crafting headlines, titles and other display type give their readers a big assist. Those that put little effort into this part of the craft do their readers a big disservice.