alt Hacker NewsThe most successful push on spelling was when the Chicago Tribune switched to simplified spelling in the 1940s through the 1960s.[1] They started with about 40 words, and gradually expanded. But after McCormick died, the company gave up, retaining only "tho" for "though". That ended in 1975.[2]
[1] https://www.spellingsociety.org/uploaded_media/tribune-media...
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/1975/09/30/archives/thru-is-through-...
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Colonel McCormick actually got together with a bunch of other large newspaper owners to push the simplified spelling. Not for any kind of altruistic reason, but to save on ink and paper.
All these people who have pushed for simplified spelling since don't realize they're carrying water for another era's long-dead barons.
/Former Tribune employee who heard it from the old-timers.
> In support of its adoption of "drouth" in place of "drought" THE TRIBUNE cites the fact that most persons use the pronunciation indicated by the first — and simpler — spelling.
This one seems very strange. Do people really pronounce the final sound as /θ/?