I have always thought that when making a word such as handful plural you put the "s" after hand and not after ful, but I have heard several news shows today use the word handfuls???

Well, Kitty, when both of your hands are full, would you say that was one handsful? Possibly.

Personally, I like the usage handfuls. My child, playing in the sandbox, may fill in a hole with both hands, but in the end, when the hole is filled, this was done two handfuls at a time, and not with one handsful at a time.

There has always been a great deal of hesitation in the choice of plural forms for compounds like this. Is it passers-by or passer-bys?. Two court martials or two courts martial? Arguably, the first would be more appropriate in the case of some unfortunate serviceman who had been convicted of some misdemeanor by two such courts, whereas the second could be taken to mean two separate courts, maybe not even in the same service.

A similar argument could be made, I suppose, for saying that two handsful would, for normal humans, at least, be the same as four handfuls. In fact, I kind of like the logic of that myself.

When using passersby vs. passerbys wouldn't the first be the correct one because passer is the plural and not the by? Just like with teaspoonsful and sisters-in-law vs. the teaspoonfuls and sister-in-laws? I just remember it from school, although since it was updated it must have been after I attended, getting old I guess!!!

Oh, BTW, the handfuls was used in this sentence

Rush Limbuahs housekeeper said that he would take handfuls of pills at a time.

Well, it's maybe a good thing for Rush that he swallowed merely handfuls of pills, not handsfuls of them. It wouldn't surprise me either way, though.

Of course, Kitty, it's the passers who are plural in the compound passers-by (or passer-bys). But both forms are in use, and this problem of where to put the plural suffix has been a long-standing source of annoyance in English usage.

There is a tendency in English syntax to put plural suffixes at the end of compound words, and this has been around for a long time. A similar problem arises with the possessive suffix. Here is a quite extreme example, offered by the noted American linguist Kenneth Pike (one of my own teachers, I proudly add):

I threw the paper wad at the back of the boy sitting in front of me's head.

Is this good English? Perhaps not, but it is readily understandable.

There is a lot more to be said about this use of what is called the group genitive in English. It is very much related to the plural of compounds you mention, and usage is not entirely settled on the subject. Nor will it ever be.

Surely there is no rule of grammar which is so sacred that it cannot be broken under any circumstances. The function of words is to convey ideas, so it matters to make your meaning clear. That done, I suggest the form you use is whichever flows more easily - in the cases quoted "handfuls" and "passers-by" get my vote.

To me - there are two different meanings here. A handful of peanuts and handfuls of peanuts. This is using handful as a measurment.

If your young child is a handful - then perhaps, you may have your hands full.

Good point, Tree. I feed my dog five handfuls of dog meal, using a handful as a measurement. It is one handful, measured out five times.

Handful may be a compound word, but in my mind it has virtually become one word in its own right, so the plural handfuls seems natural. Passerby, however, with or without hyphen, still feels like two words. Two or more are naturally passers-by.