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DENTON, Texas—Peterbilt General Manager Bill Jackson stood before a crowded press room on Monday, riddled with embarrassment.

"Uh...I feel silly," Jackson said, who took over with the company in 1998. "No one ever told me it was spelled wrong; I just assumed that since no one ever said anything that it was spelled right."

Since 1939 the Peterbilt name has provided trucks for America, but has never provided the much needed letter "U" in the word "Built."

"I think it may have started from the beginning," truck driver "Milky" said, who got his name by chugging an entire gallon of milk while balancing a whole can of chewing tobacco in his lip. "I had always heard that the founder (T.A. Peterman) just had trouble with spelling, but none of the truckers working for him noticed, so it stuck I guess."

Jackson later formally apologized to the media, and their media relations person took over answering questions mostly focused on how this could have slipped through the company's fingers for so long.

"Since the company started in the Great Depression era," PR Coordinator Mark Fisher explained, "we think that the reason for the typo was money-related. Since Peterbilt is one less letter, that is less money that has to be spent on signs, billboards, bumper stickers, and even our mud flaps or collector’s edition spittoons."

After some deliberation, Jackson returned with shocking news, saying that the actual reason for the misspelling was that the original Peterbilt truck that was delivering the trademark "Peterbilt" nameplates caught fire, burning the only load of correctly spelled plates. "I don't think that T.A. Peterman appreciated irony, either," Jackson concluded.