Bedit* (for Edit*)

At the height of the war in Vietnam, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, who were married on March 20, 1969, took advantage of the expected press attention to stage a "Bed-In" at the Amsterdam Hilton Hotel. Dressed in white and sitting in bed ("like angels," said John) beneath signs reading "Hair Peace" and "Bed Peace," the couple held court every day for a week, confusing the media and delighting their fans. ("The newspapers said say what're you doing in bed / I said we're only trying to get us some peace"—The Ballad of John and Yoko.) The two planned to hold a second Bed-In in New York City, but as John was barred from entering the country due to a pot conviction the previous year, they decided to go to the Bahamas instead. Apparently, the hotel there didn't have air conditioning, though, because they quickly changed plans again and headed north to Montreal. This time they invited Timothy Leary, Dick Gregory, Tommy Smothers, Al Capp, Murray the K (aka the "Fifth Beatle"), and others to help record the album Give Peace a Chance. Today's typo appeared 21 times in OhioLINK and 147 times in WorldCat. (Most occurrences seem to have been matters of omitting the delimiter sign in a subfield b.) All we are saying is it might have been hard to get out of bed this morning after the long, peaceful holiday weekend, but our catalogs need editing and you're just the folks to do it.

(John Lennon, Yoko Ono, and friends, recording "Give Peace a Chance," June 1, 1969, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid