Steel magnet Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) believed that English was destined to be the "world language of the future" and for that reason it should be simplified (?). To help this along he gave an organization called the Simplified Spelling Board $15, 000 a year for five years.
English readers are familiar with some of these simplifications; the best known include "nite" for "night" and "thru" for "through". Lesser known suggestions had "-ed" endings replaced with "t", as in the suitably ambiguous "mist" for "missed".
As one might expect, a conversation got in the way of the Board's recommendations and, as the "nays" outweighed the "ayes", the world moved on.
Now the Board is back, and the latest proposals are intriguing. For gerund forms that consist of the same vowel ("i") repeated twice and separated by paired consonants ("ss", "tt", "dd"), it is proposed that the first vowel be dropped. Thus, "pissing" would be spelled "pssing" and "shitting" would be spelled "shtting".
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