It’s funny how words work their way into our vocabulary and we don’t question whether they’re correct or not. Just yesterday I learned the proper term for the oil passages drilled into an engine block is “gallery” NOT “galley”.
I’d always heard the phrase “oil galley” used in reference to these passages and never questioned it. Maybe it is due to my photography background, but to me, a gallery is a place where art is hung. Galley refers to an ancient style of shop propelled by oarsmen, famously depicted in the “ramming speed” scene in Ben-Hur starring Charlton Heston.
From that, I took galley to generally mean a thing that holds stuff, like oil in an engine block. I even changed the spelling in the draft of an article Jeff wrote last week. Guess I was wrong; Doug set me straight yesterday, and ironically, we got an email from a reader saying the same thing. Point taken!