Jeff writes:
Here are a pair of abusers in Mesa, AZ. They are on opposite sides of a corner sign. While Shellyss’s is obviously new lettering over old, the old one was wrong, too.
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Okay, maybe I'm having an off day, but…I believe the second sign (Franciscas's) is actually correct, providing the person's name is Franciscas. If, however, their name is "Francisca" then…it's as hilariously wrong as "Shellyss's."
yeah I'm guessing Franciscas and Shellys were not their given namess'ses's…
Even if the name of the person is "Franciscas", I would omit the s after the apostrophe, as I do when talking about "Howard Hughes' famous Spruce Goose" or "Jesus' mother Mary". I realize it's a Fielder's Choice, but we have to think about what happens when we form the plurals of nouns that already end in s, then make possessives of them:
Mr. and Mrs. Jones have a car. Would you rather call it "The Joneses's car" or "The Joneses' car"?
I prefer the latter.