12 Years A Slave: NY Times corrects story on Northup 161 years later

New York Times: The New York Times has printed a correction for misspelling 161 years ago the name of a black man who was sold into slavery and whose memoirs were turned into the Oscar-winning movie 12 Years a Slave.In a 20 January, 1853, article, the Times misspelled Solomon Northup's surname as Northrop and as Northrup.The Times corrected Northup's name on Tuesday, after the errors were pointed out by someone looking at its archives. The correction said the article about Northup had "misspelled his surname as Northrop. And the headline misspelled it as Northrup."[caption id="attachment_1419637" align="alignleft" width="380"]

This film publicity image released by Fox Searchlight shows Chiwetel Ejiofor as Solomon Northup in a scene from 12 Years A Slave. AP[/caption]Northup was born in New York and was kidnapped and sold as a slave in 1841. He spent the next dozen years in Louisiana before regaining his freedom.12 Years a Slave won the Oscar for best picture at the Academy Awards on Sunday. It starred Chiwetel Ejiofor as Northup and Lupita Nyong'o as Patsey, another slave. Nyong'o won the Oscar for best actress in a supporting role.Associated PressCheck out tweet with original story as it came on the paper:

Here's how the New York Times covered 12 Years a Slave in 1853: http://t.co/9ITvaD6U9E pic.twitter.com/u5N1lfbSm6 — New York Magazine (@NYMag) March 4, 2014