Correction fixes only one of three errors in Page 1 story

This store on Main Street in Hackensack may have been called "Young Forever," but it didn't manage to stay in business forever.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Page 1 story focused on what "many called the greatest catch they had ever seen," but in newspaper parlance, no one "caught" three glaring editing errors.

The headline over Thursday's front-page story by sports writer Art Stapleton was missing a coma:

'The Catch' a moment they'll share forever

Giant's bracelets from a friend fighting cancer

The other errors were on the continuation page, both in the caption under the photo of Giants rookie Odell Beckham Jr. (A-12).

Beckham was misidentified, and the caption writer said the bracelets were on his left hand, when readers could see clearly they were on the athlete's right hand.

Today, on A-2 of The Record, a correction fixes only one of those screw-ups, the one that called the pro football player "David Beckham Jr."

'Good catch'?

"Good catch" is a phrase that once was heard frequently in The Record newsroom, where a supervisor would commend a copy editor or other staffer for catching an error before it got into the paper.

I doubt that phrase is even uttered any more since Liz Houlton has proven so inadequate in the six-figure job of production editor and supervisor of the news and layout editors, copy editors and page proofers -- the staffers who see stories before they go to press and write headlines and captions.

'Stop the presses'

The Record's presses are in Rockaway and the newsroom is in Woodland Park.

So, I'm guessing from the seemingly endless stream of errors, inaccurate headlines and other screw-ups in recent years, no one in the newsroom actually reads the first copies, shouts "Stop the presses!" and tries to make corrections.

If they do, what is the explanation for this latest example of sloppy editing in yet another story on the paper's most important page?

No distractions

And when errors like the ones in the Odell Beckham story are made, it doesn't help that readers see them immediately, because the rest of the front page is so dreadful.

Look at Thursday's tedious column from the pompous Mike Kelly, whose lame writing about Thanksgiving could put you to sleep even before you ate turkey.

Believe it or not, this was his second paragraph in a column that led the paper:

"Yes. Thanksgiving is generally a food-focused holiday, with countless tables crammed with turkey and all manner of vegetables and pies, and relatives and friends flocking to our front doors."

"Countless" and "all manner"? Kelly sounds like a blithering idiot.

Money talks

Thanksgiving shoppers at the malls dominate the front page today -- payback to the paper's biggest advertisers (A-1).

I noticed that the majority of the bargain hunters in photos on A-1 are white and Asian, and the majority of needy people enjoying free holiday meals on L-1 are black.

Drive-by journalism

In the Local-news section, L-3 is dominated by a large photo of a two-car crash on Route 287 south that killed one of the drivers, a 43-year-old woman from Kinnelon.

Was Jennifer Pechko a mother, daughter, aunt? Was she on her way to a Thanksgiving dinner? What caused the accident? Was the other driver charged?

You won't find any of the answers, because no one who worked the holiday -- from the photographer to the assignment editor to the supervisor of the copy desk -- gave a shit that this woman died unexpectedly on the highway.

To them, her death is merely a photo op.

The photo caption at the bottom of the same page doesn't say whether the turkey a Paramus homeowner was deep frying before his house caught fire ended up at the local food bank (L-3).

Pricey restaurant

Reading Staff Writer Elisa Ung's review of Houston's, an upscale restaurant in Hackensack's premier mall, I finally realize why I never ate there in all the years I've worked and lived in that city (BL-16).

Two crab cakes go for $37, and really don't look better than the half-dozen we buy at Costco Wholesale for $21.99.

"A flagrantly high $16" for spinach dip. A veggie burger for $19. Filet mignon for $49. 

She has been doing this cushy gig for seven or eight years, with all of her meals paid for by The Record.

Ung seems to be saying the only reason she tried Houston's is that the name came up most "when I talk to people in the restaurant business about where they eat out or the places they admire."

Maybe next week she'll write about a restaurant that isn't patronized by wealthy restaurant owners and chefs who have money to burn.

Or, she could have told readers they could assemble a reasonably priced dinner, if they stuck to the $7 kale salad, which she called "addictive," and one or two of the potato and vegetable side dishes.

And if you can persuade the restaurant to serve you the whole br0nzino, the $27 fish could be shared by two easily.