Bring back the space

When did Huntington’s South Side neighborhood become the Southside?

Old-timers here at The Herald-Dispatch — and we are becoming fewer every year, it seems — always put the space in there. The neighborhood is, after all, on the south side of Huntington.

But somehow some folks started dropping the space. The Cabell County Board of Education is thinking about naming the new elementary school in the neighborhood “Southside (no space) Elementary.” Monday afternoon, I saw a TTA bus with a sign saying it was going to the “Southside.”

And yesterday morning, I picked up The Herald-Dispatch and there on the front page was a reference to the Southside neighborhood.

When did people decide to drop the space, and why wasn’t I invited to the meeting where it was discussed?It’s South Point, Ohio, not Southpoint. The bottom of the earth is known as the South Pole, not the Southpole. For now, anyway.

It’s like dropping the “of” after the word “couple,” as in, “I saw a couple dogs in the park.”

Names can confuse people at times. Is it Greenbottom or Green Bottom? Cross Lanes or Crosslanes?

Here in Cabell County, is it Hite-Saunders Elementary or Hite Saunders? I’ve seen it both ways, even at the school itself.

We do know it’s Point Pleasant, not Pt. Pleasant. It’s Fort Gay, not Ft. Gay.

At least we were able to settle the Merritts Creek vs. Merrick Creek debate a few years ago.

About 25 years ago, I was talking to an older resident of the county between Huntington and Charleston. I asked where he lived, and he said, “Putman County.” I had heard that some people said that, but that was the first time I had heard it said.

Back to the South Side. What do the people who live in the neighborhood think? Do they want the space, or are they comfortable with one word? What goes on the new school could settle things or bring even more confusion to the language cops in the newsroom and elsewhere.

It would be good to settle this before the school board decides on a name.