“Anti-clockwise”

I was excited when a Facebook friend, Don McLeese, posted this photo: As I well knew, “anti-clockwise” (or “anticlockwise”) is the British equivalent of U.S. “counter-clockwise” (with various hyphenation alternatives). The difference has been apparently in place since both words emerged: “anti-” in 1879 and “counter-” in 1882, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. All of the OED‘s examples of the first are British, and all of the second, American. Naturally, I asked Don where he saw this. He told me it was at a health facility in Des Moines, Iowa, where he lives. I checked out the facility’s website and there is no mention of any British ownership or affiliation. Unfortunately, it seems to be kind of a one-off: American pickin’s for “anticlockwise” are quite slim. I did dig up a 2021 New York Times article about NASA where the reporter writes, “Still, the resulting numbers did not make sense until they realized they had read the 1s and 0s in the wrong direction, anticlockwise…