Talk:Black Butte (Oregon)/GA2

GA Review

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Reviewer: Llywrch (talk · contribs) 06:51, 6 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Will begin my review of this article in a few days, beginning with checking sources. Beyond that, based on a quick read of this article I see no major problems with passing it. -- llywrch (talk) 06:51, 6 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Some thoughts as I looked more closely at this article.

First, in two separate places -- the lead & in the section "Geography" -- the fact that Black Butte is located in a rain shadow is mentioned incongruously. Although the lead on an article is typically used to mention its high lights, so a sentence or two out of place may not be a serious flaw, this fact would be better included in one of the parts discussing the hydrology or the ecology of Black Butte. Or it could also be dropped entirely from the lead.
For the most part you use numbered footnotes to refer to your sources; however, in a few cases you also refer to various authors using the Harvard citation style. Although I understand why you referred to the works this way in those spots, mixing these formats can be confusing. What I suggest you do instead in these instances is to refer to the author by his/her full name if possible, or just by their last names if one or more authors is responsible for the work indicated. For example, where one finds "Taylor (1981)" just write "Edward M. Taylor". No need to indicate the year of his publication, especially since he wrote only one work you refer to here. This is acceptable practice.
As I wrote above, this article covers the numerous aspects of the subject in depth: its geography, environment, ecology, & so forth. However, there is one omission that is painfully obvious -- no mention of the Native Americans. Obviously, they would have their own name for Black Butte, as they did for almost every mountain & hill in Oregon (e.g., Mt. Hood was known as Wyeast). I missed seeing it stated here -- & this piece of toponymy should be included in every geographical article on an American mountain, stream, or lake -- & spent part of Sunday afternoon hunting that fact down. From what I could tell, the local peoples familiar with Black Butte would have included the Wasco, Tenino, North Paiute & perhaps the Molala peoples; although it appears their native languages are all extinct, ethnologists did record some of their words before their last speakers died. So the information is out there. More interestingly, I discovered Ella E. Clark's Indian legends of the Pacific Northwest (Berkeley: University of California, 1953) records a story about Black Butte she heard from Native Americans on the Warm Springs Reservation (pp. 12ff): although the older name of the mountain is not mentioned, the story offers such details as making Black Butte wife of a nearby mount now known as Green Hill. (I don't know if this book is commonly available or even still in print, so if you need help with this, let me know.)

More after I check your citations, but I honestly feel the most significant challenge to getting this article approved for a GA is including the Native Americans in the History section. -- llywrch (talk) 07:24, 16 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Llywrch: thanks for the comments; been swamped with real life stuff. I could not find the Clark book easily; if you have access I'd definitely appreciate it. I will try to get to the rest of these ASAP (in the next few days) ceranthor 00:10, 29 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I understand fully. I've been swamped at work this week too, & started having problems with my eyes late this week. I have Clark's book at hand & can add a paragraph about it. But consider my other points, & let's get this article past the finish line. -- llywrch (talk) 06:37, 29 September 2019 (UTC) Update: @Ceranthor:, I have added a paragraph providing some of the details of the story. Feel free to wordsmith it. -- llywrch (talk) 23:23, 30 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Llywrch: Sorry for the delay. Could you clarify the Harvard citation style suggestion? The references all look consistent to me. ceranthor 03:09, 10 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Ceranthor:, look at the last sentences of the 2nd & 3rd paragraphs of the section "Geography". In each sentence you refer to a work in Harvard format (e.g. "Taylor (1981)"), but at the end of each sentence there is a footnote that provides the same information -- with a page number. I'd drop the date & just provide the author's name. (IMHO, the author's full name ought to be given the first time it appears.) I notice the same thing in the section "Eruptive history". -- llywrch (talk) 04:58, 10 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Llywrch: Got it now! Think I fixed all of them - let me know if I need to tweak them more or add anything else. ceranthor 22:23, 10 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Ceranthor: I made a few cosmetic changes, but otherwise I think this is done. Passing -- llywrch (talk) 22:09, 11 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]