Proofreading: How to Read and Get Paid for It

When I graduated from college in 1975, I had a BA in English and no job. I also had no desire to drive a cab, dig large holes, serve coffee to half-awake people or drive cranky people to airports and office buildings. So I bounced around a bit, pushing paper for a publisher, packing boxes for a subscription agency and even writing news stories at no pay for a community newspaper. Then, one day I saw an ad for a proofreader.

Off to the employment agency I went and was promptly sent to one of the richest and most prestigious corporate firms in New York City, where I was quickly hired. I knew nothing about this new world, but I liked it. Instead of working in a warehouse or a crowded, dirty newsroom, I had my own clean cubicle in the Word Processing Center. Outside the Center, the lawyers offices and secretarial stations circumnavigated the floor, where the partners occupied the corner spaces in baronial splendor and the walls bore valuable prints.

Though I wondered if I would be good at the work, I adapted right away. Documents would be assigned to each of the seven teams in turn, and most days it kept each team busy most of the day. It was reading, the thing I most love to do, and though the text was dry and sometimes illegible, there was a system in place.

The proofreaders worked in teams of two, one "holding" or correcting the document, the other reading the master copy. Over my first couple of weeks, I was paired with each of the other proofreaders. Since each of them had been with the firm for a long time, and I just started, I would "read" for most jobs, the responsibility for the ultimate correctness of the document falling on the "holder". I quickly learned the ropes without having to worry about messing up. Some days were long, but it was sweet.

How sweet? How about free lunch? That's right. The firm had a cafeteria, and every day, we walked in, grabbed a tray, and ate roast beef, or meat loaf, or shrimp or stew. There were made-to-order sandwiches, salads, cakes, pies, soft drinks, ice cream.

I also had a name plate on my desk, a bonus every year, free transportation home if I worked late, and 4 weeks vacation my first year.

Since then, I've worked as a legal proofreader in many different venues and still work as one today, 25 years later, but I'll never forget the first job, the door that opened into my ideal career.