The Presidents'/President's/Presidents Day question reminds me of an 
issue that came up at Miami U about 30 years ago. The director of 
development called me frantically for grammatical advice. Yes, 
frantically! It seems that one of the university's big 
contributors-who was honored, like all big contributors,  by being 
listed as a member of The Presidents Club-refused to give any more 
unless the development office righted their grievous wrong and placed 
an apostrophe after the "s." After all, The Presidents Club was 
established to honor all the presidents of the university, past, 
present, and future. For want of an apostrophe a big donor was about 
to be lost. "Help," cried the director. Could I save the donation? 
Boy, talk about needing a grammarian.

I didn't get into the issue of genitive or possessive but of the 
history of apostrophes and esses to indicate genitive.  So, after a 
bit of research, I wrote the director a long memo, properly 
footnoted,  explaining that the s' had been "invented" to parallel 
the 's. But the apostrophe in the 's functioned to replace the e 
which originally signalled the genitive and had been lost. Since the 
s' was spurious, lots of organizations (and I listed several, though 
I've long since forgotten them) did not use the s'. I concluded that 
by omitting the apostrophe, Miami's development office was on the 
cutting edge of punctuation practice.

A week or so later, I got a thank you from the director of 
development. I'd saved the contribution and the integrity of The 
Presidents Club. I never saw an increase in my pay check, though I 
suspect that the football coach would have seen a salary increase if 
he'd brought in a big contributor. They never even made me an 
honorary member of The Presidents Club. Perhaps the director was 
ticked at me for suggesting the development office could have avoided 
the whole mess by using the adjective presidential.

Ah, well. Such is the life of a grammarian. Never fully appreciated.

Max


>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>This harks back to a discussion of two or three weeks ago.   A major
>part of the problem is calling the -'s form in English a possessive.
>It's a genitive, and possessive is only one of its functions.  JS Bear
>points out very nicely that the meaning of many phrases under dispute
>here is not possessive.  The meanings JS identifies for them are all
>common functions of the genitive, though.  Once again, it's important to
>distinguish form from function.
>
>BWT, the difference between 1,950,000 and 1,920,000 is probably below
>the level of chance.
>
>Herb
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
>[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of js bear
>Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 9:25 AM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Possessive form
>
>Call me ignorant (you'd be accurate) but I don't buy the attributive=20
>quality of a noun as opposed to a possessive quality.  I don't see the=20
>difference between Presidents day and Father's day.  Father's day is a=20
>day for fathers as Presidents day is a day for presidents.  I see no=20
>difference.  What is a day 'of fathers'?  Is nobody allowed (and where?)
>
>that day but fathers?  Or is everybody a father that day?  I think what=20
>has happened with President's Day is that some people left off the=20
>apostrophe.  They should not have.  Some other people saw it and assumed
>
>that because it was printed it was right.  They should not have.  For=20
>fun, I went to google and looked for "President's Day" and got 1.95=20
>million results.  When I searched for "Presidents Day" I only got 1.92=20
>million results.  So, I guess most people with websites or blog entries=20
>think it should have the apostrophe.=20
>
>I think the real issue with a kid's website versus a kids' website is=20
>not whether it is possessive or attributive but rather whether it is=20
>plural or singular.  Is it a website for one kid or many kids? =20
>Obviously it is for many kids as a restroom is for many men.  But...=20
>when the writer calls it is a kid's website, are they trying to=20
>personalize it?  Are they trying to say it is for you (the kid) and not=20
>all the rest of them and so it is for just one kid and so it is a kid's=20
>website?  Are they making us feel special?  Like us fathers on father's=20
>day?  Or the president on President's day?  What is 'right depends' on=20
>what is intended, but quite often what is used depends on what the=20
>writer was told was right.  But really, what is right is what gets the=20
>message across with the least amount of static.  And if we all go around
>
>writing Presidents' day, people will look at what we wrote and be=20
>distracted by that apostrophe hanging off the end.  But maybe what we=20
>had to say about President's day wasn't all that important anyway.
>
>Scott Lavitt wrote:
>>  Dear list,
>>
>>  As callers say on radio talk shows, "long time
>>  [listener], first time [caller]." I've been following
>>  the interesting topics on this list for a few years,
>>  since a prof in grad school recommended it.
>>
>>  Will someone please clarify for me which is the proper
>>  possessive form in the sentence "NickJr.com is a
>>  kid's/kids' website"?
>>
>>  I'm trying to see the difference between an
>>  attributive quality, such as Presidents Day (a day
>>  _for_ presidents) and a possessive quality, such as
>>  Father's Day (a day _of_ fathers).
>>
>>  My inclination is that TV programming for kids
>>  (plural) is "kids' programming," just like a rest room
>>  for men is a "men's room," not a man's room. Another
>>  example, of course, is "women's room." So one would
>>  say a website for children, such as Nickjr.com, is a
>>  children's website, right? Therefore, if a more casual
>>  term for children is "kids," isn't it a "kids'"
>>  website?
>>
>>  Even though I've investigated a couple of my favorite
>>  grammar books on the subject--Googled for examples
>>  too--my current understanding of the matter is
>>  evidenced above.
>>
>>  Respondents, thank you very much for your time.
>>
>>  Scott
>>
>>  To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
>interface at:
>>       http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
>>  and select "Join or leave the list"
>>
>>  Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>>
>>
>>   =20
>
>To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
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>
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