A fresno is a motorless road grader often drawn by a span of mules or horses. Fresno is a town in California. I added fresno in all lowercase to my custom dictionary word list; Word still flags an error. I know it is picky but after writing fresno five times and having to click 'ignore once' five times I am no longer a fan of Word. Anyone know how to convince Word I know the difference between a town and a machine?

Adding to the custom dictionary should work. However custom dictionaries are language specific and you can only add words to the default dictionary so ensure that the language associated with that dictionary is set to all languages. File > Options > Proofing > Custom dictionaries.

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Nope -> File > Options > Proofing > Custom dictionaries - I have added 'fresno' and 'fresnos' the plural and the plural works. I only have CUSTOM.DIC which is the default.

Try selecting "fresno" and under Review > Language > Proofing Language, check "Do not check spelling or grammar."

Then, with it still selected create an AutoCorrect entry named frsno. You will want this to be a formatted entry. Whenever you want to use fresno rather than Fresno, use the short form AutoCorrect trigger without the e.

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Either I don't understand formatted entry or typing frsno and letting it autocorrect to fresno doesn't solve my problem; it does add more work but Word still flags an error and I have to click 'ignore once' each time I rewrite, change or correct within that sentence. It is still better than proofreading but

BEGIN RANT
I can and do add words all the time; a word like Los as in Los Vegas, Nevada. It doesn't do it with golden while there is a Golden in Colorado - it does it with Kleenex because that trademark is still valid but the term fresno has been used as a generic term since the 1890s and in the west could be anything from a Caterpillar horse drawn road grader to a traditional 5' dump Fresno scraper; that use is not capitalized like a crescent wrench should be as the patent holder Crescent Tool Company still holds the trademark. I feel any word should be able to override like when I writing about a caterpillar referring to the larva of a butterfly or moth.
END RANT

Anyone else have an idea

Before you save the entry, you need to format it to not check spelling or grammar.

Again:

1. Select "fresno" with it showing the spelling error underline.
2. Under the Review tab, pick language and then proofing language.
3. Check the box for "Do not check spelling..."
4. OK back to your document.
5. With that selected, not showing an error now,
6. Create your frsno AutoCorrect.

It may be a lot of work to set up, but what it inserts will not trigger a spelling error.