CMS
Q. While proofreading a colleague’s work today I referred to page 306, section 8.48 of the fourteenth edition of CMOS, which shows examples of abbreviations for divisions of the day. The example I intended to point out is the third one, “12:00 P.M. (midnight).” My colleague showed me her CMOS (same edition) and asked me to point out the example. In her copy, only the first of the five examples is the same as in my copy. The others are different. Other than the two sets of examples, we can find nothing that differentiates the two copies of the book; nor can we find any indication of which copy was printed more recently. Which version has the correct examples? Are there any other differences that we might encounter? Thanks in advance for your response.
A. Don’t you just love a good mystery? Your colleague’s book is correct, and is a more recent printing than yours. If you look at p. iv, at the line just below “Printed in the United States of America,” you can see what printing your book is by checking the number at the very end of the line. Over the years, we issued about ten printings of the fourteenth edition. Each time we reprinted, we corrected errors that had been pointed out since the last printing. In section 8.48 we wanted to eliminate two examples that seemed more confusing than helpful. For the fifteenth edition, we have made several clarifications, including the recommendation that numerals not be used for midnight and noon except in the twenty-four-hour system. Note also that the fifteenth recommends writing “a.m.” and “p.m.,” though the more traditional small capitals are still accepted (but now without periods: AM and PM).
