Talk:Hamilton Disston/GA1

GA Review

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I'll be reviewing this article shortly. Ealdgyth - Talk 14:21, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

   needs more in the lead, a few spots where the prose is unecncylopedic or tough to understand

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   lacks coverage of much besides his land purchases in Florida

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

   a few spots of slight peacocky phrasing

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

Specific concerns

• General concerns:
  • A bit of overlinking going on. Is it really necessary to link England, executive, volunteer fire department, emigrated, French, black bass, canals, hand saw, etched, Chinese, swamp., cents, wharf, pier, hacksaws, files, etc.
  • The article is unencylopedic in parts. Certain information that would be expected to be in the article body (Hamitlon's birthdate, his mother's name, etc) just are not. Did he go to school at all? I suggest looking at other GA examples, suggest modeling the article more after James F. Robinson, Bill Haywood, or Walter Potter
  • Another concern I have is the heavy emphasis on the land purchase. If there is not enough information to at least attempt to give a more balanced picture of the man's life, I strongly suggest reworking the informaiton into an article strictly on the land purchase and reclamation efforts. Right now, it feels very WP:COATRACKy, with undue emphasis on the land details, and very little on the man's life.
  • THe picture needs source information so that we know that this is indeed him. The given source for the information no longer exists as a web page, so I have no way of judging whether they got the right person.
  • There are two website refs in the notes that need last access dates.
• Lead:
  • Lead is too short for the length of the article. Given the size of the article, I would expect two pretty full paragraphs, not four sentences.
• Early life:
  • Unencyclopedic language "..but he persevered..."
  • Suggest that the fact that the family fromn descended from nobility isn't really relevant.
  • Uncited statement: Within a few years, he would put the possibility to the test.
  • What importance is it that Henry was orphaned within days of arriving in the US?
  • This section is incomplete, who was Hamilton's mother? We get the information that Henry had a first wife, but who was Hamilton's mother? You don't mention Hamilton's birth date in the Early life section, but it's given in the lead. You need to mention that Hamiliton had brothers in the early life section.
• Disston Land Purchase:
  • The last paragraph of "Early LIfe" would fit better in this paragraph, as it has direct bearing on the information presented.
  • There is no need to put the quote from Kelley off in block quote, it would flow better as a simple quote in the body of the article, it's not long enough to require block quoting.
  • "The drainage contract, however, was in jeopardy because it did not affect the massive debt bearing down on the Internal Improvement Fund." HUh? Do you mean that the drainage contract was in jeapardy because it did not take into account the debt?
• Purchase effects:
  • "Land sales were six times more lucrative after the sale..." lucrative in this context makes no sense. Suggest "Land sales increased six fold after the sale..."
  • "He marketed himself as owning two-thirds of the entire state." is odd phrasing, making it seem like he was marketing HIMSELF for sale. Suggest "His advertising for the land stated that Disston owned two-thirds of the entire state." Also, surely that was not true at this point?
  • "Disston drew people to the Orlando area and the major cities of Sarasota and Naples, Florida grew out of land sold by Disston." is unclear. You mean, I hope, that Disstan's land office sales drew folks, not that he himself drew them?
  • "Refineries for the plantation ran in Kissimmee and Lake Okeechobee." is awkward. Suggest "Sugar refineries were set up in Kissimmee and Lake Okeechobee." as simpler
  • "The key to Disston's Florida plans was a massive dredging effort to drain the Kissimmee valley into Lake Okeechobee and then guide the overflow of Lake Okeechobee through canals into the St. Lucie River and then into the Atlantic Ocean in the east, canals into the Caloosahatchee River and into the Gulf of Mexico in the west, and canals south through the Everglades." is awkward, especially the last bit. Suggest "The key to Disston's Florida plans was a massive dredging effort to drain the Kissimmee valley into Lake Okeechobee and then guide the overflow of Lake Okeechobee into canals. These canals would drain the water through the St. Lucie River and and into the Atlantic Ocean in the east, the Caloosahatchee River and the Gulf of Mexico in the west, and through the Everglades to the south."
• Disston city:
  • Did Disston city become Pinellas? It's implied that it did, because of the last sentence of the first paragraph, which says "further developign Pinellas" when previously you'd been discussing Disston city. If this is the case, it needs to be made explicit. If this is NOT the case, it needs to be made clear what Pinellas has to do with the rest of the paragaraph
• Disappointment:
  • "Meanwhile, Lake Okeechobee flooded worse than it had..." worse than it had when? Before? The reader is left dangling.
  • When did he move back to PHiladelphai? Before 1893? After? The date should be in the article so a proper chronology can be established.
  • "On April 30, 1896, Disston had dinner with the mayor of Philadelphia and attended a theatre production with his wife in Philadelphia.[37] The following morning, he was found dead at age 51." Unneeeded detail about the dinner. Suggest "On the morning of May 1, 1896, Disston was found dead, after a normal evening of socializing." or something similar.
• Personal:
  • This section feels tacked on to the end of the article. It would make more sense to integrate the information into the body of the article in the chronological order it best fits.

I've put the article on hold for seven days to allow folks to address the issues I've brought up. Feel free to contact me on my talk page, or here with any concerns, and let me know one of those places when the issues have been addressed. If I may suggest that you strike out, check mark, or otherwise mark the items I've detailed, that will make it possible for me to see what's been addressed, and you can keep track of what's been done and what still needs to be worked on. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:20, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Let's put this down as a fail then - the things wrong with the article are almost as long as the article itself. I flat-out disagree with half of these and, as such, won't do them. Things you say are not relevant I think are perfectly relevant. Questions about missing detail are simply due to lack of references. If no one has documented where he went to school (140 years ago), how am I supposed to rectify that? We put people's birth dates in the article body and in the opening now? If I'm so far out of touch with article writing that I missed that development, then I have no business dabbling in this article status nonsense. Sorry for wasting everyone's time. Wknight94 ^talk 11:06, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Ok. After going through my sources and additions, seeing your copy edits (sometimes the overlinking issue is like bailing out a sinking canoe, so I sometimes enjoy the bath instead of furiously pitching water back into the boat), I wanted to see what there was left to address.

• The article reflects the majority of material written about Disston. I agree it is less about his life than the effect his industrialization and investment in Florida had on the future growth of the state. I found one potential book about Disston's life in my library's special collections department, which of course, I cannot check out. Everything else I read concentrated on his money and his canals. Florida historian Charlton Tebeau called him Florida's "good fairy", while Marjory Stoneman Douglas intoned a less positive legacy.
• I don't care much about the French nobility thing and wanted to see what Wknight94 had to say about it.
• His mother's name is mentioned now, and the thing about Henry's wife dying I could not find in multiple sources so I removed it.
• That Henry Disston was orphaned days after he arrived in the US as a child I think should stay in. He built an empire in Pennsylvania that became the start of the US steel industry and left it to Hamilton and his brothers. I added the info on Henry's planned community in Tacony since it appears this is what Hamilton was trying to do in Florida.
• I wanted to see what was still unclear about the IIF issues. I'll see if I can tinker with that.
• I'm not sure how to address the personal life and such. I have the Grunwald book and will take a look to see if there is other information in sources at the time.
• Let me know what you think. --Moni3 (talk) 16:44, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Are there standards now on overlinking? A zillion years ago, when Tim Foli still qualified as GA (standards were different then - but then weren't we all?) someone pointed out that they were confused by what I considered everyday terms. I'm shocked that black bass is inappropriate to link, or wharf. I'm still not sure what a wharf is so I'm going to link it here! wharf, wharf, wharf. I guess I'm also shocked about the French nobility thing. How is that not relevant? It's not a huge deal which is why it occupies one-third of a sentence, but how many thousands of nobility articles do we have in the system? There's an entire Wikiproject dedicated to nobility (WP:PEERAGE). Ask them if nobility heritage deserves a third of a sentence. The source itself for the IIF stuff was confusing to me too so I just hacked it in as best and accurately as I could. Please do re-word if it becomes more sensible. I sometimes ain't writin' so good. Henry's wife dying must be in some source - I wouldn't make that up - so I'll try to find where I got it when I can get to my books again (a few days probably). No big deal either way on that. Regardless, thanks to everyone for building the article out some more. Wknight94 ^talk 17:49, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

• I can't find my copy of The Swamp, unfortunately. About Henry's first wife dying, I'm sure it happened, I suppose, or at least you did not make it up, but it is confusing that she died before Hamilton was born. I could find no mention that Henry remarried. And the article on Henry's paternalism only mentions Mary Steelman. Another biography of Henry Disston mentions her name only. I'm continuing to search for more. --Moni3 (talk) 17:58, 1 July 2009 (UTC)