How many really dumb errors can a NYT reporter make in one story?

The date of the moon landing wrong in the middle of the 40th anniversary?

A correction running today:

An appraisal on Saturday about Walter Cronkite’s career included a number of errors. In some copies, it misstated the date that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed and referred incorrectly to Mr. Cronkite’s coverage of D-Day. Dr. King was killed on April 4, 1968, not April 30. Mr. Cronkite covered the D-Day landing from a warplane; he did not storm the beaches. In addition, Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon on July 20, 1969, not July 26. “The CBS Evening News” overtook “The Huntley-Brinkley Report” on NBC in the ratings during the 1967-68 television season, not after Chet Huntley retired in 1970. A communications satellite used to relay correspondents’ reports from around the world was Telstar, not Telestar. Howard K. Smith was not one of the CBS correspondents Mr. Cronkite would turn to for reports from the field after he became anchor of “The CBS Evening News” in 1962; he left CBS before Mr. Cronkite was the anchor. Because of an editing error, the appraisal also misstated the name of the news agency for which Mr. Cronkite was Moscow bureau chief after World War II. At that time it was United Press, not United Press International.


http://www.nytimes.com/ref/pageoneplus/corrections.html

 

Looks like there was at least one too many furlough in the editing/fact-checking department, but you're right, sure looks like a sloppy job by the writer, too.

 

Looks to be five. And one line editor error.

 

Wow. Some of those are basic history facts. The date of the moon landing is something every sixth grader should know, just like the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The date of MLK's death should be up there too.
Very sloppy.

 

Before the other day, and probably again in another day or two, no chance I can name the date off the top of my head.

If that makes me dumb or whatever, fine. But I wouldn't assume that every sixth-grader should know the date of the moon landing.

 

And I thought this was going to be about Jayson Blair.

 

Yeah I wouldn't have known it either.

 

But you would have known it if you were going to write about in a story because you would have checked it.

 

Agreed. But someone said every sixth-grader should know it. That's what I was disagreeing with.

A reporter? Um, yeah, he or she should get it right. Just like anything else.

 

gawker likes to have fun with the reporter's errors:
http://gawker.com/tag/alessandra-stanley/

 

All that was in one story? Damn. That's terrible for any publication, but the NYT?

 

Why is this woman still employed? She's not even a good writer, which sometimes can make up for blatant errors.