1980s or 1980's?
I think their spelling people are confused.
This is an interesting question.
Use an "s" without an apostrophe after the year to indicate spans of decades or centuries.
1900s is the period from 1900 to 1999.
An apostrophe after the year is needed for possessives.
Example: The presidential election was 1980's biggest news story.
Hi Sophia,
"Alternatives" are the suggested corrections. What's in the small box is what's in your document.
The suggestion is correct.
An apostrophe is used to indicate possession (Sophia's shoe, Barry's hat) or contraction (John's going out later, but he's home now—contracting "John is" and "he is").
1900s is the correct spelling to represent the ten year period from 1900 to 1909 or the hundred year period from 1900 to 1999.
Examples where "1900's" is correct would include this use as a possessive:
"Engine Number 1900's drivers had flat spots from an emergency stop on its last run."
Regards,
Barry
Thank you, Barry and Kappy. The confusing part was at the bottom where Pages suggests that I spell out the decade as "eighties" for 1980's, contradicting what they just said to do.
Yes, I can see where that would be confusing! 😮
Barry
This is dependent more upon the particular style sheet you are using. Some accept 1980's while others prefer you spell it out as in "eighties" while some may even argue for "Eighties."
I think you are quite right in remarking that whoever put together the spelling/grammar checking in Pages likely did not know what they were doing. I'll bet they don't differentiate between the words "further" and "farther."
Which is the right spelling suggestion?
