The day The Chronicle discovered burritos will live in...

January 24, 1977 was a slow news day by any definition. The Chronicle led the front page with two stories about vice-president Walter Mondale’s upcoming trip to Europe.

But anyone who stayed awake long enough to read to the bottom of Page 4 stumbled across a striking piece of local food journalism history: The San Francisco Chronicle had discovered burritos.

“The burrito — a fat morsel named for its resemblance to a small donkey — may be the next food craze to come out of an ethnic ghetto and win a permanent place in America’s eating habits,” the article by The Chronicle’s Jerry Burns began. “… If the boom grows, the burrito may soon join such traditional American favorites as chow mein, chicken soup, pizza and the frankfurter.”

Time has offered zero mercy to this article.

Each paragraph is a checklist of overgeneralizations, questionable word choices and factual stretches. (Historians offer several competing theories on the etymology of the word “burrito.” “Named for its resemblance to a small donkey” is not definitely not one of them.)

And yet it’s important that, even if we don’t offer 41-year-old retraction to the story, we learn from this dark moment in publishing history. “Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants.” — Louis D. Brandeis

Here are some lowlights:

“The burrito varies slightly from place to place but is basically an oversized flour tortilla smeared with sauce, packed with rice, beans and meat, then folded into a short, fat rectangle.”

The article describes the food several different ways — and each time it’s wrong. It’s as if the author deliberately avoided looking at a burrito while reporting the story. “Short, fat rectangle” is how you describe a transistor radio in 1977.

This is frustrating, because there are so many other acceptable ways to describe the shape of a burrito. “Cylindrical.” “Torpedo-shaped.” We would have even accepted “the rough dimensions of a legless manatee pup.”

Where were the editors?

“The burrito boom in the city seems to coincide with the growing number of taquerias, the fast food Mexican restaurants sometimes called “Mexican McDonalds.”

No one in history has ever called a taqueria a “Mexican McDonalds.” Not even one of those young tech workers who writes a Medium post about how much the homeless in San Francisco are grossing them out.

If you call a taqueria a Mexican McDonalds, you will be evicted from San Francisco. It’s in the city charter.

“The trend away from tacos and toward burritos is nationwide, according to officials of the huge Taco Bell chain.”

This may be the worst part of the story. The Chronicle, planting its flag for what would be multiple generations of Mission District burrito coverage … quoted an unnamed executive from Taco Bell.

“According to the local burrito-moguls, the tasty little rectangles are not known by that name in large parts of Mexico.”

This is, to credit Mr. Burns, 100 percent correct, and a very nuanced turn. But again with the rectangles.

The Chronicle apologizes for the error …

Peter Hartlaub is The San Francisco Chronicle’s pop culture critic. Email: phartlaub@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @PeterHartlaub