User talk:Srh27041968

October 2008

Thanks for experimenting with the page Woolston, Cheshire on Wikipedia. Your recent edit appears to have added incorrect information, and has been reverted or removed. All information in the encyclopedia must be verifiable in a reliable published source. If you believe the information you added was correct, please cite references or sources or discuss the changes on the article's talk page before making them. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you want to do. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia. Thank you.  DDStretch  (talk) 12:27, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Good afternoon. I have lived in Woolston all of my life, for 40 years. I was born in Woolston, Warrington, Lancashire. I have been on the local Parish Council since 1989. Woolston has been in Lancashire for 908 years. The mere fact that it was administered for 24 years by Cheshire County Council is neither here nor there. When Warrington was administered by Lancashire County Council, no-one in Warrington, south of the Mersey (<22% of it's population) claimed to live anywhere but Cheshire. Warrington has always been a town of two counties (see the borough council coat of arms that features but the wheatsheaf of Cheshire and the red rose of Lancashire. With the proliferation of Unitary authorities, maybe it is time for what are chiefly ceremonial counties in many areas, to re-establish their traditional boundaries. Administrational geopolitical borders change frequently whether it is for the common good or good old fashioned gerrymandering, county boundaries have NEVER changed. Worth also mentioning on the page that Woolston was the birthplace and home of 'Old Billy', accepted widely as the only reliably aged horse to have lived over 55 years. In fact, he holds the record by in excess of 7 years, a life that included 30 years of work pulling barges on the Bridgewater Canal and in excess of 30 years in retirement, living out his last few years in a field where the Grange Sports and Social club is nowadys in Latchford, Warrington, Cheshire. Billy was born in 1760 on an undetermined date and passed away on 25-11-1822. He lived throughout the entire reign of King George III (1760-1820)and was over 62 years of age when he died. There are paintings of Old Billy from 1820, grazing in a meadow opposite the rear of St Elphin's parish church, which at the time had a dome not the spire that is visible for miles around today!

Shaun Reid Hampton BSc (Hons), MSc, PCGE, MPhil, FRGS.

Hello Shaun Hampton, I am User:Jza84, an administrator for Wikipedia who has been made aware of the changes you made to Woolston, Cheshire.

Please do not make changes to county boundaries in articles on Wikipedia. It is our policy, formulated by broad consensus, to use modern, administrative county boundaries when discussing places in England and Wales. Inserting places into the "traditional boundaries" (i.e. pre-1974/1997) of counties is something which is very much frowned upon by the editting community at large, is considered disruptive, and may get the article frozen or you blocked from editting. For better or worse this is the way forwards. Historic county boundaries may be mentioned in an afternote, an example being Stretford.

As a courtesy, I have transcluded a standard welcome template (below) to aid you with any future editting you wish to perform. Please spend some time having a look at our Wikipedia:Introduction. Thank you, --Jza84 |  Talk  21:24, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Welcome!

Hello, Srh27041968! Welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. You may benefit from following some of the links below, which will help you get the most out of Wikipedia. If you have any questions you can ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Please remember to sign your name on talk pages by clicking or by typing four tildes "~~~~"; this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you are already loving Wikipedia you might want to consider being "adopted" by a more experienced editor or joining a WikiProject to collaborate with others in creating and improving articles of your interest. Click here for a directory of all the WikiProjects. Finally, please do your best to always fill in the edit summary field. Happy editing! --Jza84 |  Talk  21:24, 23 October 2008 (UTC) Getting Started Wikipedia Tutorial • The five pillars of Wikipedia How to: edit a page • upload an image Getting Help Frequently Asked Questions Where to ask questions or make comments Request administrator attention Policies and Guidelines Neutral point of view • Reliable sources Verifiability • Citing sources • No original research What Wikipedia is not • Biographies of living persons Manual of Style • Three-revert rule • Sock puppetry Copyrights • Policy for non-free content • Image use policy External links • Spam • Vandalism Deletion policy • Conflict of interest • Notability The Community Community Portal • Adopt-a-user program Assume good faith • Civility • Etiquette No personal attacks • Resolving disputes Build consensus • Village pump Signpost • IRC channels • Mailing lists Things to do Be bold in editing • Help develop an article Pages needing attention • Peer review Join a WikiProject • Translating articles Cleaning up: General • Spam • Vandalism Miscellaneous Categories • Disambiguity • Stubs User pages • Talk pages Useful templates • Tools • User scripts

Many thanks for your response. Whilst I appreciate what you are saying, you cannot have it both ways. Warrington ceased to be adminstered by Lancashire and came out of Lancashire in 1974, when the administrative (not county) boundary changed. Surely when we ceased to be adminstered by Cheshire in 1998, we came out of Cheshire also! You cannot come out of Lancashire and not Cheshire as a result of the same process - administrative boundary changes! I am sure this would be the line of the Boundary Commission, as we have a unitary authority. Therefore Warrington is NOT in ANY administrative county at present but in county terms must revert to its' TWO ceremonial counties - Cheshire south of the Mersey and Lancashire North of the Mersey!!

Following the Wikipedia accepted logic therefore we are no more in Cheshire now, as we were in Lancashire in 1984.

Thanks

Shaun

I appreciate your answer, but it does have a problem: in matters of fact, the kind of logical reasoning you have used is not as telling as the facts themselves, and the facts themselves can be obtained by looking at the various reliable sources. It might be helpful to review the information about the verification by citation of reliable sources which wikipedia makes greater and greater use of now to help us write articles. The situation you describe in your point above has been taken into account by laws made in 1997 specifically in part for the new unitary authorities. I draw your attention to the articles and reliable sources mentioned in them for Lieutenancies Act 1997, and the related article: Lieutenancy area. In short, Warrington and its borough, along with Halton remain in the ceremonial county of Cheshire subsequent to them becoming unitary authorities. Don't worry. There is a lot to get used to, but I hope you can gain a better grasp of the way wikipedia does things so that you can contribute well to the project in the future.  DDStretch  (talk) 10:15, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Hello Shaun, I side with you on this one. Wikipedia is far too pedantic in its approach to British Counties (that's pedantry on the part of editors by the way). I suggest you edit the article to include a section describing how Warrington IS in the hsitoric county of Lancashire. As you know, the historic counties were not abolished in 1974, although local councils would have us believe otherwise. There is certainly nothing wrong with referencing the historic counties in an article, and not merely as footnote. Mister Flash (talk) 12:01, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I do not think the advice to ignore the policy and guidelines is at all sustainable in this instance: it may be in others, but in this case, inserting lengthy passages that attempt to justify a position that has been shown to be incorrect by means of references to legislation is not a sensible way to proceed. This is is an old dispute that has taken up many hours of editors' time to counter the work of a few editors who have an idiosyncratic view of things.

If you, Srh27041968, wish to mention the fact that some places used to be in Lancashire, then it would be perverse for anyone to say that that would be unacceptable if it were placed in a History section, so go ahead. However, placing it in the lead as if it were the current situation would be giving it far too much weight in a position in the article which would not be the best place for it. Place it, along with adequate references (or ask for help to get the references right) in a History section, and I'm sure all will be well.

If you are a parish councillor (which I believe you said, above), then you must surely know that the Lieutenancy for Cheshire still covers Warrington even after it was made a unitary authority, which indicates that Warrington is still in the ceremonial country of Cheshire, regardless of its unitary authority status, and so that should give you enough of an idea that the advice I have given is correct, that the guidelines I have pointed you to are sensible, and that you can proceed in the way forward I have suggested. If you are not sure, then I'm sure a question to either the parish clerk (Mr D Pendleton, as indicated on this website) or the current chairman (I'm not sure who that is now) would quickly get the correct information, or would you like me to get the ball rolling on that for you?  DDStretch  (talk) 21:36, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I've now edited the history section, expanding it considerably using reliable sources that have been cited. I think this gives the correct weight to the history of Woolston in Lancashire.  DDStretch  (talk) 16:34, 25 October 2008 (UTC)