Anyway, to me the humor to me was the incorrect American use not only in a discussion of punctuation use, but also in a phrase with the word Oxford!

I should probably point out to Fred that I'm not American, so the punctuation for me goes outside the quote mark unless the entire sentence is a quotation (and one or two other minor exceptions that I won't go into here). Same as with punctuation and brackets, on reflection.

I believe that Fred Schwan’s Oxford comma sentence should have been written “’Oxford comma’,”

Having been on holiday for a while I have picked up this subject a bit late. Just in case you are still not totally fed up with the subject, here is the opinion of Elina Screen, deputy editor of The British Numismatic Journal.

This is one where I don't think there's a single "right" answer. The inclusion of the final comma in a list before the "and" is sometimes also called the "Oxford comma". The BNJ follows the Modern Humanities Research Association guidelines, sometimes slightly tweaked. This does advise including the last comma (styleguide pp. 33-4, which can be downloaded free here: www.mhra.org.uk/Publications/Books/StyleGuide/download.shtml ).

But as the guide points out, the golden rules are internal consistency and clarity to the reader. So, providing the meaning was clear and the author had either consistently included or excluded the comma, personally I'd not change it. I think this usage is more about personal preference rather than having much grammatical significance.

I place myself firmly in the camp using the Oxford comma, when it is proper.

Kudos to you for use of 1930s! 1930's is only correct when referring to something pertaining to the year 1930, such as 1930's best movies.

My personal, understandable pet peeve over the use of the apostrophe appears to be a losing battle in recent decades, but it is one I will fight to my demise. This is the dropping of a second "s" when using the possessive form of a name ending in "s," such as Evans. This is Evans's opinion. If it were Evans' opinion I would wonder, "Just who are these Evans?"

Q. I have suddenly become an editor and am having trouble on a daily basis with the numeric use of decades. First, is “the 90s” or “the ’90s” correct? We often see the apostrophe omitted these days. Next, if a sentence contains the phrase, “Perhaps the 70s best director . . .” (meaning, the best director of that decade), “70s” is both plural and possessive. Should it be “70’s”? “70s’”? Other than reconstructing the sentence, what’s an editor to do?

A. Strictly speaking, ’90s, with the apostrophe, is correct.

The ’70s’ finest director was Martin Scorsese, particularly for his work on Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore and Taxi Driver.

Note the apostrophes, both of them. You are always free to write “seventies’ finest.” Or, “The finest director of the ’70s was assuredly Francis Ford Coppola, for his work on the first two Godfather films and Apocalypse Now.”

Q. When indicating possession of a word that ends in s, is it correct to repeat the s after using an apostrophe? For example, which is correct: “Dickens’ novel” or “Dickens’s novel”?

A. Either is correct, though we prefer the latter. Please consult 7.15–18 for a full discussion of the rules for forming the possessive of proper nouns. For a discussion of the alternative practice of simply adding an apostrophe to form the possessive of proper nouns ending in s, see paragraph 7.21.

Whitman Publishing uses the Chicago Manual. What I normally do is add an extra 's' if the word is short, not if it is long:

• Jones’s house is painted purple
• Aristotle Onassis’ yacht is for sale

Current usage (including that recommended by the Chicago Manual, but not exclusive to it) is to add the ‘s’ to form the possessive of singular names ending in ‘s’ (e.g., Maria Callas’s gown), with possible exceptions for (a) names ending in an “eez” sound, like Aristophanes (e.g., Aristophanes’ tuba) and (b) biblical names like Jesus and Moses (e.g., Moses’ cardigan), just because tradition for these has always been to use just the apostrophe.

What really baffles and vexes me these days is to see people use the apostrophe to make plurals and the plural form instead of the possessive. I do not get this at all.

I have really enjoyed the ongoing discussion on comma usage. Your readers may wish to read Michael Leddy’s blog on punctuating sentences with commas: http://mleddy.blogspot.ca/2007/04/how-to-punctuate-sentence.html .