Q. Friends have just moved into a new house — let’s call it Gamekeepers Folly. I am planning to give them a handmade visitors’ book as a present, but am in somewhat of a quandary as to what to tell the embosser to put on the front. Should I have the missing apostrophe inserted or not? The official records do not have it. My friends are well-educated people but I have not yet had their new notepaper so do not know if they have picked up the point. And if so, should I assume there was only one (‘Gamekeeper’), or several?
— Name withheld, Shaftesbury
A. If it really were called ‘Gamekeeper’s Folly’ then the apostrophe would go before the ‘s’. However you have not revealed the true name of the house. There are addresses where incorrect grammar has, through long misuse, become correct, but you cannot assume this is one of them.
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