( CNN ) -- It 's a correction more than 160 years in the making . In its Tuesday edition , The New York Times published a correction for an article that ran on January 20 , 1853 . The newspaper has Hollywood and Twitter to thank for bringing the error to light . The Times explained that the article in question told the story of Solomon Northup , a free African-American man who was kidnapped and sold into slavery . Northup 's memoir , `` 12 Years a Slave , '' was turned into a movie that won the best picture Oscar at this year 's Academy Awards on Sunday . Opinion : Why you should see '12 Years a Slave ' The problem was that the 1853 article spelled Northup 's name wrong , in two different ways . It appeared as Northrop in the body of the article and Northrup in the headline . As the Oscars focused attention on `` 12 Years a Slave , '' a Twitter user unearthed the old article from The Times archives , and it spread quickly on social media . `` The errors came to light on Monday after a Twitter user pointed out the article in The Times archives , '' the correction said . One of the Twitter users who spotted the mistake is Rebecca Skloot , the author of `` The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks . '' After the correction ran , Skloot tweeted , `` The irony , of course , is that I 'm a terrible speller and proofreader . '' 150 years later , paper retracts editorial panning Gettysburg Address .
The article , published more than 160 years ago , misspelled Solomon Northup 's name . Comment: Northup 's memoir , `` 12 Years a Slave , '' won best picture at this year 's Oscars .