Talk:Sybil Ludington

Possible copyright problem

This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:38, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

B class review

This will be a B class article when these issues are addressed. BTW: There are very few military history articles about women, and I'm pleased to see this one. Djmaschek (talk) 00:58, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

• Historical accounts, paragraph 1. "Ludington rode 40 miles from her hometown to Putnam County, New York". It's not clear to me where her "hometown" is located. The logical assumption is that she lived in or near Danbury, but that is not mentioned anywhere in the article. Please add that information.
  • It was in the preceding section, but bears repeating in this new section: added. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:28, 9 July 2022 (UTC)
• B class articles must be fully cited. (The introduction does not usually need to be cited since it is a summary of the narrative.) There are two places that lack citations, as follows.
  • Research history, paragraph 4, last sentence.
    • It was already cited, but I moved the citation so it would be more easily noticed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:25, 9 July 2022 (UTC)
  • Legacy and honors, paragraph 2, last sentence.
    • Two last sentences cited: [1] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:22, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for looking in, User:Djmaschek. The article was quite a mess when I found it, with a lot of leftover text from the poorly cited version, so I had envisioned keeping it at C-class. But since you found so little that was needed to take it to B, I went ahead and made your suggested edits as well. How unfortunate it is that Wikipedia was propogating a story that is questioned by scholarly sources, and using non-reliable sources published by her family to do that! I hope it's cleaned up now, thanks again, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:32, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

• @SandyGeorgia: B class. It looks good now. Patterson (aka Fredericksburg) is 13.7 miles from Danbury by the shortest route. This raises the question: where did she get the news that the British were attacking Danbury? If she started from Patterson, then someone must have first delivered it to Patterson. Patterson is in Putnam County, so presumably she rode a circular route that included nearby towns. The question of whether Sybil's ride actually occurred is clearly discussed in the article, so it's not for us amateurs to decide what is correct. Our job is to state what is published about this person. Djmaschek (talk) 03:56, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

  @SandyGeorgia: And don't worry about the comments above that say this should not be an article because it's only a legend. After all, there is a Wikipedia article about Coel Hen (Old King Cole) who was a legendary figure in 4th century Britain. If the US Post Office printed a stamp about Sybil, there needs to be an article! Djmaschek (talk) 04:09, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

  Yep. The route was made up, so I didn't even try to sort that :) The 40 miles was allegedly because she visited many different towns (not a linear route). Yes, the article meets notability. Thanks again for looking in. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:24, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

Recent edit warring

In edits of 11 July, 162.83.190.171 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) is stating that Ludington's birthplace is Branford. They say it can be cited to Dacquino; a page number is needed. Higher quality sources (Hunt) say Fredericksburg. I can add a footnote saying that sources disagree if IP 162 stops edit warring long enough to allow cleanup.

IP162, edits must be sourced. Books require page nos. If we you want to contradict higher quality sources used here, please provide quotes and page nos from the books you want to use. Other sources indicate Dacquino is not entirely neutral on the topic, and Purple Mountain Press is not high quality. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:58, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

IP162, please review this source and this one and consider that Dacquino might be wrong. Her father was born in Branford; I have found no high quality source that makes the claim that Sybil was, and Purple Mountain Press is not a widely known publisher. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:04, 12 July 2022 (UTC)

Also, since high quality sources do not mention that Ogden served with John Paul Jones, we don't need to either (see WP:DUE); this is not his biography. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:21, 12 July 2022 (UTC)

Fixing

In this version, I propose to fix the following:

1. "At the age of 23, in 1784 Ludington married Edmond Ogden. They had a son named Henry in 1786." This should not be cited to a source of marginal reliability for this claim (a town's website), when it can be cited to a peer-reviewed, scholarly publication. (Hunt 2015, p. 189.)
2. "Edmond was a farmer, innkeeper, and had served with John Paul Jones." None of this is mentioned in any high-quality source I am aware of. Because scholarly sources indicate that much of this story involves "family folklore" and "fiction", we should not be repeating undue information unnecessarily; this is not Ogden's bio, and we don't need to include this information at all. Hunt does cite military sources on Ogden, and if someone can access those sources, it may be possible to add more information about Ogden, but we need not do this based on books of marginal reliability published by relatively little known presses.
3. Replace modern accounts source list with those mentioned in scholarly sources, to avoid random list of books.

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:53, 12 July 2022 (UTC)

Done, in this version of 13 July. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:02, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

Birth location

I would like to state that, the location of birth should be disputed. We can not stand with only one source on this B class article. I personally also agree with ip 162 on the topic of birth location. The reason I think stating Edmond Ogden served with John Paul Jones is important because Sybil later in her life tried to get edmond’s pension. 63.143.104.2 (talk) 19:09, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

We need to use clearer words in introduction

heroine, is a word full of value judgement that conveys nothing. What is she claimed to have actually done?John Pack Lambert (talk) 14:16, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

The second sentence of the lead states what she was alleged to have done. Putting all of that in to one sentence would create a convoluted run-on; I hope readers are able to digest more than one sentence ??? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:10, 3 July 2024 (UTC)