Basic Ledes: One Sentence Is Better Than Two

Most of the time, we'd like to keep ledes to one sentence. This one had two:

Three people were injured when a train struck a car Monday evening in East Lansing. Police say the driver of the car failed to stop at a stop sign.

I would say this lede could have been merged into one sentence by moving word order around so that the supporting fact (why the crash happened) fits into the main point (how it unfolded).

So I would take that second sentence and fold its main point into the narrative of the first sentence, like this:

Three people were injured when a train struck a car that failed to stop at a stop sign Monday evening in East Lansing.

Now, it's one fewer sentence, a few less words and you're still including the what and why in the lede.

Controversial: Be Efficient With Words

It's important that you look for unnecessary words and strip those out of your work. Like in this lede:

The East Lansing School Board has made a decision on Tuesday to implement a ban to no longer allow boys from competing in girls' sports.

It's a good lede, but wordy. First, do you need to say has made a decision to when just saying decided would suffice?

Second, isn't saying implement a ban and no longer allow the same thing? I'd get rid of one of those, or even both. After all, doesn't ban say all that in just one word? What we have left is this:

The East Lansing School Board decided Tuesday to ban boys from competing in girls' sports.

Is there any difference in meaning or context or detail than the first lede? I'd say not. It's just a lot shorter and less wordy.

Basic Ledes: Consider Flipping The Lede

With many ledes, we want to emphasize the news over the sourcing; that is, what happened gets priority over who it happened to or who said it.

Let's look at this lede, where the sourcing comes first:

A study led by sociologists at the University of Florida found highly educated women are more likely to end up in a failed marriage compared to women without degrees.

Now, that's a fine lede. Very solid. But I would argue that it can amplify the main point a bit more by what I call flipping the lede; that is, changing the sequence from source-finding to finding-source -- essentially, just moving the start of the lede to the back -- like this:

Highly educated women are more likely to end up in a failed marriage compared to women without degrees, a study led by sociologists at the University of Florida found.

Now, you start right out with the news, and then get to who discovered it. Notice I did not change, remove or add any words; it is exactly what you wrote. Just in a different sequence.

Was it necessary? No. But I think it does improve the lede just a bit more.

Are there times when you should have the sourcing first? Yes, when the source itself is newsworthy, like if President Obama announces something.

Basic Ledes: Merge Sentences

The best ledes are just one sentence in length. And often, when you have a two-sentence lede, it's easy to merge it into one. Like here:

County treasurer Vernon Sindelair pleaded guilty to embezzlement Wednesday morning. Sindelair was charged with embezzling over $1.7 million and faces up to 30 years in prison.

A cue to look for in whether you can abbreviate a lede is whether you refer to something twice, like you do to Sindelair and embezzlement. Usually, you can cut that down to one reference by rearranging word order and eliminating redundancy, like this:

County treasurer Vernon Sindelair pleaded guilty Wednesday morning to embezzling over $1.7 million and faces up to 30 years in prison.

Getting rid of the second references also allows us to merge the sentences. And we lose no significant meaning at all. It's just shorter and clearer and less choppy. 

Squirrels: Watch Your Wordiness

I have a big example and a small example.

First, the big one. This is what one of you wrote:

Laura Ruffenboch, a wildlife professor at LCC, has attempted to shed some light as to why this odd set of circumstances has come about. Ruffenboch said that many electrical wires are made from soybean derivatives, making them attractive to squirrels.

Let's look at the first sentence. It's something I call an empty sentence, in which you're not saying anything. All you're saying is that there's something to say, and then you say the specifics in the next sentence.

So, why not get rid of that first sentence and move its full attribution to the second sentence, like this:

Laura Ruffenboch, a wildlife professor at LCC, said that many electrical wires are made from soybean derivatives, making them attractive to squirrels.

What's missing in terms of meaning and context and facts? Nothing. Just the wordiness is gone.

Now, here's a small example. Why say professor of English at LCC Oliver Brookes when you can reverse word order in the title and call him LCC English professor Oliver Brookes?

Ledes: Ledes I Liked

I'm happy to say that everybody did no worse than pretty good in this assignment, which in the past has been an ungraded piece of classwork. This year I'm going to give you some credit, though: you all get a boost to your overall quiz grade that's equivalent to 10 out of 10 on a single quiz. Which everybody could use.

On this first assignment, it was far less important that I grade you and more critical that you get used to writing in a journalistic style and under a newsroom-type deadline before it starts counting for something.

Still, I think you're right where you need to be. Let's look at some of the ledes I thought worked well:

Forty-three percent of American marriages break up within 15 years due to marrying young and being less religious, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

It identifies the most telling statistic, highlights it and provides a source for it. Nice work. This one collects a variety of factors:

Women who are wealthy, religious, college-educated, and at least 20 years old when they marry are less likely to get divorced, according to the Centers for Disease Control.


Next is this:

Mayor Datolli will introduce a new panhandling ordinance next week that will provide one-way bus tickets out of town to vagrants.

It has who: the mayor who is acting, and homeless people being acted upon (though is it okay to call them vagrants, or is that a stereotypical slur that should have been replaced with the term "homeless people"?). It has what: the mayor wanting to boot the homeless out of here. It has when: as soon as next week. It has how: one-way bus tickets for the homeless. Four of six W's are covered here, and in only 22 words.

Next is this:

A local swimming pool is being sued for extensive injuries to a local resident who claims swimming officials failed to warn him of immediate lightning danger last summer.

Again, it sums everything you need to know in a simple, straightforward way. This next lede -- which was done by my fall 2011 class, and not this one -- went a step further, and honed in on context:

Erik Barsh was going to be a senior tennis star until last summer when he was struck by lightning. Now he is in a legal volley with the city.

This is a more complex type of lede known by various terms, including a delayed lede (where the lede sets up a following nut graf that reads more like a basic lede) and an anecdotal lede (where in this case you are humanizing the subject a bit before plunging into the reason why this particular human is worthy of news coverage).

I didn't plan for you guys doing anything beyond a basic lede for this exercise, and it's fine that you did not. We'll talk about alternate ledes and as the term goes on I'll encourage you to try more complex forms of story-telling. But if you want to fall back on the basic lee structure for now, that's perfectly fine. What I want to see you demonstrate for now is proper identification and fact selection. And a basic lede does that just fine.


Now, there are some things missing from these and other ledes, like proper use of the word allegedly, and proper attribution use and style. But since we haven't learned those things yet, you weren't docked. And we'll get to learning those things very soon.

911: Say What You Mean; Mean What You Say

This lede says something you didn't mean to say. Let's read it literally:

An East Lansing man was arrested today for allegedly raping his neighbor in response to a brave 6-year-old's 911 call placed to the East Lansing Police Department.

What you just said the rape was in response to the 911 call. What you mean to say was that the man was arrested due to the 911 call, like this:

An East Lansing man who allegedly raped his neighbor was arrested in response to a brave 6-year-old's 911 call placed to the East Lansing Police Department.

Let's ignore that the sentence is a bit run-onish. Now, improved word order better recognized the sequence of events while minimizing the chance of any reader confusion.

Say what you mean, and mean what you say.

Squirrels: Watch Your Wordiness

Almost all of you called Oliver Brookes an associate professor of English.

Why not revise word order and shorten it to, an associate English professor?

Also, don't be afraid to cut to the chase, like in this graf:

Laura Ruffenboch had an explanation for why the creatures could be attracted to the cars. Ruffenboch is a wildlife professor at Lansing Community College. Ruffenboch said that the insulation on many electrical wires is made from a derivative of soybeans and squirrels may find that attractive.

There's a lot of wordiness here. The first sentence says she has an explanation but not what the explanation was, so it's not necessary. The second sentence simply states her position, and doesn't say anything else of value. The third sentence actually gets to the point.

I think you can eliminate the first sentence and merge the second and third sentences to say this:

Laura Ruffenboch, a wildlife professor at Lansing Community College, said that the insulation on many electrical wires is made from a derivative of soybeans and squirrels may find that attractive.

Now, the reader loses nothing except two sentences. Their fundamental understanding of who Ruffenboch is and what she has to say is unchanged.

Graded Ledes: Watch Word Order!

Watch your word order for opportunities to shorten sentences.

For example, why say, "was the victim of a carjacking" when you could say, "was a carjacking victim" and save two words in the process?

More Ledes: Clarity Via Word Order

Often, word order can help create clarity by putting information in a sequence that clearly spells out what happened. Conversely, poor word order can leave things a bit jumbled.

In that sense, this lede had a bit of room for improvement:

A 22-year-old died in a car accident this morning on the way to his wedding by veering off the road to avoid hitting a stray dog.

In this case, you could have arranged fact sequence to pair up commonalities, like this:

A 22-year-old on the way to his wedding died in a car accident this morning by veering off the road to avoid hitting a stray dog.

Before, the fact the man died and how and why he died was split in half by the wedding mention. In the reordering, the crash elements are placed together, and now the sentence flows a bit better.

Ledes: Be Economical With Words

Look for places where you use a bunch of words when fewer words would suffice. And use direct language. Like here:

Erik Barsh is suing the city for last year's lightning accident that happened at a municipal swimming pool which left him severely injured and his friend deceased.

Let's take out "that happened." What's left is this:

Erik Barsh is suing the city for last year's lightning accident at a municipal swimming pool which left him severely injured and his friend deceased.

Does the reader lose anything other than two words? I'd say no. So, if the words don't add anything to the lede, why add the words?

Also, in journalism we try to use direct language. So, instead of saying the accident left his friend deceased, why not just say it left his friend dead?

This next lede had several problems regarding bets word use:

Mayor Datolli proposes a controversial busing systems plan to assist vagrants to move on and out of the city.

First, did you need to say controversial busing systems plan? I would think controversial bus plan would suffice.

Second, how about move on and out? Couldn't you just say move out and not lose any conveyance of meaning?

Third, is it offense to refer to homeless people as vagrants? Let's try to avoid terms that can legitimately be seen as offensive.

Ledes: Understand What You Are Writing!

This lede surprised the heck out of me:

A senior citizen was arrested and charged with grand theft and adoption fraud after faking a pregnancy for the purpose of receiving benefits from the Hope Agency.

Uh, where did you get that the person was a senior citizen? I don't see that in the information you were provided. Additionally, if you did think that, wouldn't you question it because senior citizens can't get pregnant?

I suspect you may have mistaken the woman's apartment number -- 74 -- with her age. Make sure you understand what you are writing before you start writing.

I can't decide if that should get the award for the biggest goof of the day. This next lede is certainly a contender:

A woman was arrested today for grand theft and defrauding an abortion agency by faking her pregnancy.

Oy, vey. I know you meant adoption. But that's not what you wrote. Please, proof-read your work because spell check won't catch you using the wrong word, as long as the wrong word is spelled correctly.

There were two such cases of that. In another instance, someone wrote "lighting" when they meant to write "lightning." Again, spell check is a supplement to but not a substitute for reviewing the story yourself, line by line.

If this happened to be a normally-graded exercise, all three of these examples would have qualified as fatals and an automatic grade of 1.0 out of 4.0. So let's be careful out there.

In the same vein, make sure what you write can be understood clearly by others. This one leaves a bit of room for interpretation:

After receiving $12,000 to pay for medical expenses and signing adoption papers for a made-up pregnancy, police arrested Cynthia Lowrie for grand theft and defrauding of the agency.

Readers can probably figure this out on their own, but let's look at what you wrote in a literal way: did Cythnia do all that before she was arrested? Or did the police do all that before arresting Cynthia? You would have been better off to eliminate any chance of misunderstanding like this:

After Cynthia Lowrie received $12,000 to pay for medical expenses and signed adoption papers for a made-up pregnancy, police arrested her for grand theft and defrauding of the agency.

(There's something else to consider here: in your lede, you shifted between tenses. At one point you were going with -ing, and at another you shifted to -ed. Try to maintain the same tense throughout.)

This next lede also leaves some room for confusion:

Mayor Datolli announced today that she will introduce a new ordinance to the city council to decrease the amount of panhandling at their annual Tuesday meeting.

Again, let's read this literally. You are saying that they are trying to decrease the panhandling that happens at their meetings. Obviously not what you meant to say. Better word order would have helped make that point clear, like this:

Mayor Datolli announced today that she will introduce a new ordinance to the city council at their annual Tuesday meeting to decrease the amount of panhandling.

Neither lede is the most confusing lede ever. Not even close. Still, our job as journalists is to be precise. Leave no room for mistaken interpretation.

FYI, technically there's a fatal there, too: you had no information that meetings were annual, which by definition means once a year. Again, be careful with word use.

Finally, make sure you identify the latest highlight and outcome in your lede. This one did not do that:

Erik Barsh suffered brain and nerve injuries and the loss of a friend after they were hit by lightning at a swimming pool when lifeguards failed to evaluate swimmers.

The latest event wasn't that they were hit by lightning. That happened a year ago. The reason it's news now is because Barsh is now suing. This lede may have worked if it was a delayed lede, followed by this:

Now, Barsh wants the city to pay for that.

Or something like that. Either way, just be sure that what you're pegging your story on is what makes it news. And what usually makes it news is whatever is new.

Ledes -- Word Order Can Shorten Your Ledes

One lede started like this:

The financial crisis of East Lansing has led city officials to ...

Instead of "the financial crisis of Easy Lansing," why not reorder that phrase to say "East Lansing's financial crisis" and ditch the "the" and "of"?

You end up saying the exact same thing, but much more efficiently. See if you can use word order to shorten phrases and sentences and be economical with how many words you have to use.

Ledes -- Who's Getting Married?

Word order can seriously impact the meaning of what you write. Like here:

A local 22-year-old was killed when he lost control of his vehicle while trying to avoid a dog on the way to his wedding.

So, who was on his way to his wedding: the 22-year-old or the dog? Literally read what you wrote here: " ... a dog on his way to his wedding."

Yes, readers can assume you meant the person. But we're not in the assumption business; we're in the make-things-crystal-clear biz.

Now, why was this not a fatal? I can't say this was a factual error, just confusing and prone to misinterpretation.

To be more clear, I might have changed the word order to this (caps mine):

A local 22-year-old was killed ON THE WAY TO HIS WEDDING when he lost control of his vehicle while trying to avoid a dog.

See how the reordered sentence eliminates any chance for confusion?

Make sure that you aren't saying something you don't intend to say.

Speech -- Better Word Order . . .

. . . equals shorter grafs! For instance, you can rearrange this . . .

In a speech made Sunday night made by the surgeon general, alcohol has been recognized as the nation's number one drug problem among youth, and the alcohol industry is taking advantage.

. . . to this . . .

In a speech Sunday night, the surgeon general recognized alcohol as the nation's number one drug problem among youth, and the alcohol industry is taking advantage.

In "made by the surgeon general, alcohol has been recognized," I dropped the empty "made" and then rearranged "surgeon general," "alcohol" and "recognized" while cutting the then-unnecessary "made by" and "has been."

See how this streamlines things?

Here's a simpler example:

. . . according to the Surgeon General of the U.S. Public Health Service, Tom Izzo.

Why not just reorder it to say:

. . . according to U.S. Public Health Service Surgeon General Tom Izzo.

. . . and drop the "of the"?