This is the Lucretia Crocker Elementary School in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, where I began my education when I was six years old in 1948.  I remember loving school then, and being taught things you never hear of today, like square dancing, etiquette, and poetry. My favorite subject was always English, the only class in which I excelled. Teachers then were very fussy about grammar and diction, one didn't say "ain't", use a double negative, or employ "was" when "were" was the correct usage.  I cannot remember a single class, ever, where the teacher said, "You must never pronounce Ts in the middle of words." Why? Because they never did. I mention this because I cannot understand why so many Americans have totally given up on so many interior Ts that should be pronounced but aren't. Did a dictate come down of which I wasn't aware? Why does everyone say innanet, innastate, innaview, atlannic. and romannic to name just five out of hundreds of mispronounced words? True, there are some announcers and celebrities who still pronounce them correctly, but very few. Yes, this is an obsession with me. And I wish others gave a damn, but they don't seem to. Does it matter? Yes. Because when these words are properly pronounced, they sound so much better.

Note: I cringe with annoyance every night when David Muir comments about, "an accident on the
innastate".