McIntyre was born in Kentucky and grew up in Elizaville, in
Fleming County, Kentucky. He graduated from Fleming County High School in
Flemingsburg, Kentucky in 1969. He then earned a bachelor's degree in English from
Michigan State University in 1973. From 1973 to 1979 he attended
Syracuse University, earning a master's degree in English but leaving without completing his doctorate. From 1980 to 1986 McIntyre worked as a copy editor at
The Cincinnati Enquirer. He became a copy editor at
The Baltimore Sun in 1986. On April 29, 2009, McIntyre was laid off by
The Sun. He was rehired in 2010 to serve as the newspaper's Night Content Production Manager. He retired from
The Sun in 2021, after accepting a buyout from the newspaper's new owner
Alden Global Capital. In 1997, McIntyre helped to found the
American Copy Editors Society, and subsequently served as its president for two terms. McIntyre maintains a
blog called "You Don't Say" on the
Sun website, discussing a variety of topics including
grammar usage, journalism, and copy editing. The blog received an average of 20,000 to 30,000 monthly pageviews in 2017. His online following grew after posting a video on the grammatical use of the
singular they which received over 1 million views. His blog has weighed in on various topics related to grammar, such as the controversy over the trademarking of
Cafe Hon and
"Weird Al" Yankovic's "
Word Crimes". He is the author of two books published by Apprentice House Press at Loyola University Maryland,
The Old Editor Says: Maxims for Writing and Editing (2013) and
Bad Advice: The Most Unreliable Counsel Available on grammar, Usage, and Writing (2020). ==References==