No, We Didn’t Call Him ‘Mr. Loaf.’ (Mostly.)

No, We Didn’t Call Him ‘Mr. Loaf.’ (Mostly.)

Matt StevensReporting from Brooklyn 🦇

Frequent readers of The New York Times know that for the vast majority of its stories, Times style calls for courtesy titles. President Biden on second reference is “Mr. Biden.” The second time we mention Joe Schmo, he becomes Mr. Schmo.

Meat Loaf was born Marvin Lee Aday and took his stage name from a childhood nickname. For many years there was a legend, both inside and outside the newsroom, that in a fussier age The Times had, in absurd deference to its house style, called him “Mr. Loaf” on second reference.

No, We Didn’t Call Him ‘Mr. Loaf.’ (Mostly.)

Matt StevensReporting from Brooklyn 🦇

The headline of that Times review, written presumably with the lead in mind, was: “Is He Called Just Plain Meat Or Should It Be Mr. Loaf?”

But that headline was tongue-in-cheek — a joke, a one-off, Merrill Perlman, a top editor on what was then our copy desks, wrote in 2007.

“In other words,” she wrote, “we didn’t mean it.”

Ask the Editors: Merrill Perlman