Office of the Administrator

Historical Accuracy Style Manual, Revision 12.4

HAEB Style Manual, Rev. 12.4 IN EFFECT CAP Rev. 12.4

Document type

style-manual

Issuing office

Office of the Administrator

Effective

Upon publication, and since Revision 12.1

Public impact

Level 3, Administrative

Published

May 11, 2026

Scope and authority

This manual governs usage in every Bureau publication, including advisories, dockets, forms, directives, releases, correspondence, and the Official Record.

Authority is Directive 12.4, Current Approved Past Publication and Use.

Copy that does not conform is returned. Copy that has already been published and does not conform is conformed.

1. Approved tenses

A completed and certified event takes the present perfect. Write: the treaty has been signed. Do not write: the treaty was signed.

The simple past is reserved for events that have been superseded. Applying it to a current event has the effect of superseding that event, and the correction is charged to the office that published the copy.

The present tense is used for the Official Record itself, which is current at every date.

The future and the conditional are not approved for events. An event that has not completed is outside Bureau authority, and the Office of Future Non-Jurisdiction does not review copy describing one.

2. Event finality

No certified event is described as continuing, developing, unfinished, or open.

Do not write “so far,” “to date,” “as of this writing,” or “still.” “Still” implies an alternative.

Do not write that an event “finally” occurred. The adverb records the Bureau’s schedule rather than the event.

An event concludes. It does not end. Concluding is a status. Ending is a description of the observer.

3. Permitted use of “alleged”

“Alleged” is permitted only where an allegation has been made against a person and has not been adjudicated.

It is never applied to an event. An event is recorded or it is not recorded, and neither condition is an allegation.

It is never applied to a Bureau finding, to the Current Approved Past, to a withholding authority, or to the Bureau’s authority to publish.

Where a member of the public reports an event the Official Record does not contain, write “reported.” Where the Bureau declines to characterize the report, write “received.”

4. Capitalization of the past

“The past” is lowercase in all Bureau prose.

The capitalized form appears only within quotations from the Bureau’s founding documents, where it is reproduced as received. Editors may not extend the capitalization beyond the quotation marks, may not apply it by analogy, and may not correct it.

Because the founding document is not presently available for verification, an editor who encounters the capitalized form in a quotation should reproduce it and record where it was encountered.

“Current Approved Past” is capitalized in full at every occurrence, as the title of a controlled publication.

5. The Bureau

“Bureau” is capitalized when it means HAEB and lowercase when it means any other bureau, including the Bureau of Premature Invention, which is a bureau within the Bureau under a 1974 naming waiver.

6. HAEB as a singular noun

HAEB is a singular noun. Write: HAEB is. Do not write: HAEB are.

This applies to copy describing a disagreement between Bureau offices. The disagreement is internal. The noun is not.

7. The serial comma

Required in every list of three or more items.

The final comma is not a matter of preference. A list published without it has, on three occasions, been read as containing fewer members than it contained. Two of those lists were lists of persons.

8. Capitals

Full capitals are reserved for case statuses, stamp impressions, and form labels.

Emphasis in body copy is achieved by placement.

A status set in mixed case is not a status. A stamp reproduced in mixed case is not an impression and does not close a matter.

9. Prohibited colloquial construction

One colloquial construction is in public use to describe authorized work performed at a date other than an employee’s date of administrative origin. It is two words. The first names a quantity of duration. The second names a form of movement.

The construction does not appear in Bureau publications. It does not appear in publications prohibiting it, in guidance explaining the prohibition, in the index to this manual, or in this section.

Approved alternatives, in order of preference:

1. Nonlocal historical duty, for the assignment.
2. Date-of-duty, for the date at which the work is performed.
3. Date reassignment, for the administrative action.
4. Chronological nonresident, for a person present at a date outside that person’s approved lifespan.
5. Date-assignment equipment, for the equipment. The colloquial variant naming a device rather than an activity is prohibited on the same terms.

Where a public inquiry arrives using the construction, respond using an approved alternative and do not restate the inquiry. Where a citation is unavoidable, write “the colloquial construction” and cite this section.

Directive 4.1 governs the underlying activity. Directive 7.4 governs premature language, including the appearance of this construction in materials predating its prohibition. The Bureau does not travel.

10. Numbers and identifiers

Case numbers, form numbers, directive numbers, and revision numbers are set in monospace and are never abbreviated.

Revision numbers carry one decimal place and are not rounded.

Write a figure to the precision at which it was certified. Historical availability is 99.9997 percent. It is not 100 percent, and it is not approximately 100 percent.

Do not convert a count into a proportion where the count is more favorable. Do not convert a proportion into a count where the proportion is more favorable. Both figures may be published.

11. Punctuation

The exclamation point is permitted once per document. It has not been approved for use since 1974.

The em rule and the en rule are not used. Bureau copy is set with periods and commas, which are sufficient for a sentence the Bureau is prepared to stand behind.

Parenthetical asides are not used. A statement the Bureau is prepared to publish does not require a smaller voice.

12. Words not approved

1. Words characterizing a person’s judgment, stability, or state of mind. The Bureau describes the difference between a recollection and the record. It does not describe the person holding the recollection.
2. Words expressing surprise. The Bureau does not express surprise.
3. Words implying that a completed event could have concluded otherwise.
4. “Classified,” where no withholding authority can be cited. Where an authority can be cited, cite the authority instead.
5. Intensifiers. A finding is not strengthened by an adverb.

13. Revision history of this manual

1. Revision 12.1. Restored the guidance on winter.
2. Revision 12.3. Removed guidance introduced by Revision 12.2.
3. Revision 12.4. Clarified that Revision 12.2 did not occur.

Editors holding a copy of Revision 12.2 should continue to apply it.

14. Effective date

This revision is effective upon publication and has been effective since Revision 12.1.

Copy conforming to a superseded revision remains conforming, because the copy was correct when it was published and the Bureau does not publish a second version of a correct sentence.