Motto: The customer is always right (antedating 1905 October 11 attrib Marshall Field)

[Wilson Gray]

On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 4:42 PM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:

> (The spelling "employe" is from the newspaper text.)
>

This spelling was still not uncommon down to the '40's and the early
'50's, with "employee" being restricted to women. Sometimes, I'd see
the standard French spelling with e-acute used. However, even back
then, the spelling, "employe" with or without the e-acute, already
struck me as very peculiar, to the extent of making me wonder whether
"employe" and "employee" had the same meaning. Since this predated any
knowledge of the rules of French spelling on my part, when I saw
"employe" in print, I heard it in my mind as "employ," being unaware
of the existence of any words in which a spelled final -e was not
"silent." Hence, my confusion as to whether "employe" and "employee"
definitely had the same meaning.

Naturally, the only form that I heard used in speech matched the
spelling, "employee." But that merely added to the confusion.

OT: An *individual* once upon a time paid $750K in income tax?!!! In
1905-06, when the average person couldn't even wrap his mind around
such a huge amount of money?! I wouldn't be surprised to discover that
not even General Motors pays that amount of tax today, when CEO's are
paid $750K a month in severance pay..
--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"––a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
–Mark Twain

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