Again, the apostrophe and the possessive!

Question

The following comes from the business section of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Lund Food Holdings owns two local supermarket chains, Lunds and Byerly's. Obviously, an apostrophe which was formerly part of the name has been dropped from Lunds, but that is not the possessive which interests me.

From page 1E of the November 30th Pioneer Press:
"The first store will be built at 313 Central Avenue Southeast, just north of the river at the site of the current Rick's Market. Lund Food Holdings bought Rick's' three Minnesota stores in April for an undisclosed sum."

Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com

Usenet · Accepted Answer

[nq:1]... at the site of the current Rick's Market. Lund Food Holdings bought Rick's' three Minnesota stores ...[/nq]
That's somewhere I'd probably choose to rephrase rather than worry about the punctuation ...
Tell me: Is "Rick's Market" a market that belongs to Rick, or is "Rick's Market" the proper name of a business?
In the first case I'd probably write "... bought Rick's three ..." and in the second it would be "... bought Rick's's three ..." or "... bought Rick's Market's three ..." if rephrasing was not an option.

"Rick's'" is pretty gut-churning.
Cheers,
Daniel.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]The following comes from the business section of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Lund Food Holdings owns two local supermarket ... site of the current Rick's Market. Lund Food Holdings bought Rick's' three Minnesota stores in April for an undisclosed sum."[/nq]
The one that I would have a problem with is Ruth's Chris Steak House.

Usenet · Answer

Tony Cooper filted:
[nq:2]"The first store will be built at 313 Central Avenue ... Rick's' three Minnesota stores in April for an undisclosed sum."[/nq]
[nq:1]The one that I would have a problem with is Ruth's Chris Steak House.[/nq]
I can't afford that place...I eat at Carl's Jr..r

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Tony Cooper filted:[/nq]
[nq:2]The one that I would have a problem with is Ruth's Chris Steak House.[/nq]
[nq:1]I can't afford that place...I eat at Carl's Jr..r[/nq]
Which ice cream do you prefer, Haagen Das' or Ben and Jerry's's?

Ross Howard

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Tony Cooper filted:[/nq]
[nq:2]The one that I would have a problem with is Ruth's Chris Steak House.[/nq]
[nq:1]I can't afford that place...I eat at Carl's Jr..r[/nq]
CHEAP EATERY
Whenever I'm scared by the state of my purse
I dine at the 'Gold-Digger's Claim',
where the food is so out of comparison worse
you forget that the price is the same.
By Piet Hein of course,
Jan

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]The following comes from the business section of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Lund Food Holdings owns two local supermarket ... site of the current Rick's Market. Lund Food Holdings bought Rick's' three Minnesota stores in April for an undisclosed sum."[/nq]
I couldn't help laughing at this: Lund is an offensive word for ***** in Urdu.

Ayaz Ahmed Khan,
"The only people who make love all the time are liars." Louis Jordan

Usenet · Answer

Wow, this is pretty pathetic having a message board for a smal grocery store. I don't see why everyone is making a big deal out o Rick's becoming a Lunds. It isn't even a for sure thing yet

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Wow, this is pretty pathetic having a message board for a small grocery store. I don't see why everyone is making a big deal out of Rick's becoming a Lunds. It isn't even a for sure thing yet.[/nq]
What is Rick's, what is a Lunds and why should we care?

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]Wow, this is pretty pathetic having a message board for ... a Lunds. It isn't even a for sure thing yet.[/nq]
[nq:1]What is Rick's, what is a Lunds and why should we care?[/nq]
In a post to alt.english.usage and alt.usage.english , which can be seen in the Google Groups archive at
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.english.usage/msg/cf410ba742d57e0e

I questioned the following possessive form which appeared in a newspaper article: "Rick's' three Minnesota stores."
Perhaps "RicksMarketBagger" saw the Usenet post via a Web page and posted the above thinking he was posting to the Web page rather than to a Usenet group.
(I will say that the original article was rather strange in suggesting that downtown Minneapolis would finally be getting a real grocery store I don't remember that as being their exact words, but it was the gist of the article. Rick's Market is a grocery store of a size and type that was common before the era of the warehouse supermarkets. Lunds is also a pre-warehouse type of supermarket, but one which caters to the upper-middle-class and the rich.)

Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]What is Rick's, what is a Lunds and why should we care?[/nq]
[nq:1]In a post to alt.english.usage and alt.usage.english , which can beseen in the Google Groups archive at[/nq]

[nq:1]I questioned the following possessive form which appeared in anewspaper article: "Rick's' three Minnesota stores." Perhaps "RicksMarketBagger" saw the Usenet ... of the warehouse supermarkets. Lunds is also apre-warehouse type of supermarket, but one which caters to the upper-middle-classand the rich.)[/nq]
I see now that Google Groups archive puts the messages posted under the title "Again, the apostrophe and the possessive!" into the same thread as those messages posted under the title "Wow, this is kinda wierd." This would appear to be proof of my hypothesis that "RicksMarketBagger" the person who first posted under the title "Wow, this is kinda wierd." was replying to my post mentioning Rick's Market.

Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com

Again, the apostrophe and the possessive!

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