etc."

* * * * *

This does not exhaust the list of possible beginnings. There are a dozen
possible constructions for the beginning of any story; these are merely
the commonest ones. Anything unusual or of doubtful grammar should be
avoided because of the many possible alternatives that present
themselves. And in every lead correct grammar should be considered
above all else. If a lead is ungrammatical no clever arrangement of
details can make it effective or other than ludicrous. For instance,
this lead, taken from a newspaper, illustrates an unfortunate attempt to
crowd too many details into a short lead:

| Bitten by a rattlesnake, Myrtle Olson's|
|leg was slashed with a table knife, |
|washed the wound with kerosene, then |
|covered the incision with salt by her |
|mother. Myrtle still lives. |

Another paper tried to arrange it more happily, thus:

| Bitten by a rattlesnake, Myrtle Olson's|
|mother slashed her daughter's leg with a |
|table knife, washed the wound with |
|kerosene, then covered the incision with |
|salt. Myrtle still lives. |

There is evidently something wrong in this. It would be a good exercise
to try to express the idea grammatically.

* * * * *

Before we go on to the consideration of the body of this story a few
_Don'ts_ in regard to writing leads may be in order.

Don't begin a lead with a person's name unless the person is well known.
We are always interested in anything unusual that a man may do or
anything unusual that he may suffer, but unless we know the man we are
not at all interested in his name. Suppose that a man performs some
thrilling act or suffers some unusual misfortune in a city of 100,000
people. Probably not more than one hundred people know him, and of that
number only one or two will read the story. Then why begin with his name
when his action is of greater interest to all but a few of our readers?
And yet every reader wants to know whether the victim is one of his
friends. Therefore the man's name must be mentioned in the lead,
although it should not come at the beginning. On the other hand, if the
man is prominent in the nation or the community and well known to all
our readers, his name adds interest