Coming up on Word Matters, an unusual project that has the whole language backwards.
I'm Emily Brewster,
and Word Matters is produced by Merriam-Webster in collaboration with New England Public Media.
On each episode,
Merriam-Webster editors explore some aspect of the English language from the dictionary's vantage point.
In the basement of Merriam-Webster's Springfield,
Massachusetts headquarters are 129 cardboard file boxes.
containing in total about 315,000 slips of paper,
each slip having on it a word typed neatly and typed backwards.
Next up,
Peter Sokolowski and I talk about Merriam-Webster's most mysterious mid-20th century project,
the Backwards Index.
In the Merriam-Webster office in Springfield, Massachusetts,
there is in the basement a section of wall that has all of these narrow, small cardboard boxes.
They're like shoe boxes except that they're big enough for three by five slips of paper.
And there are many, many boxes all stacked.
And in each box is many, many, many slips of paper.
And each slip has a word written backwards in its upper left hand corner.
And then the same word written forwards immediately underneath it.
Peter.