Talk:List of Stuyvesant High School people

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[edit] What happened to Richie?

Huangj2 deleted Richard Ben-Veniste (class of 1960) from the notable alumni list on 3 June 2004. I can't understand why. Ben-Veniste is indeed an alumnus, one of the biggest boosters the school has got in and around the Federal government. And he's certainly notable - he helped bring down one president, defended another, and he's currently a member of the 9-11 Commission, among other appointments.

Can we please add him back? -RossPatterson 00:19, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with him but I added him back since you seem to be confident that he belongs here. -A1111 23:32, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Robert Moses

Robert Moses '52 is NOT the "famed urban planner" Robert Moses, who couldn't possibly have been in high school in 1952. I haven't heard of him before, but this appears to be him: [1] Dreyfus 06:42, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Eagle Eye Cherry

Does anyone have an actual citation for Eagle Eye Cherry (added to Notables 18 Nov 2004) as a Stuyvesant student? All I can find is http://www.nndb.com/people/922/000041799/ at NNDB.Com, which doesn't seem to be a source much concerned with accuracy. His official bio just says "At the age of 12, he was sent to school in New York". RossPatterson 23:10, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The Alumni Association says he's not a Stuyvesantian, so I removed him. RossPatterson 04:33, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New Info

There are a prodigious amount of Stuy alumni who have sat on the Supreme court of NY bench, do you think we should add them? also I looked at the Brooklyn Tech page and saw that they have all the AP's listed should we do that here? abulanov 05:56, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Category

I see A1111 has created a category for Stuyvesant, "Category:Stuyvesant High School", and folks are now adding it to the assorted pages about Stuy alumni. I'm going to chase down the ones that don't have it and add it. We should probably remember to do that when a new one is created (hmm, sounds like a job for "StuyBot" (just kidding!)). RossPatterson 17:53, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Reorganization

Hi all, as you can see I am in the process of completely reorganizing this list, and also added quite a few more names to one of the categories.

I claim that it is much more revealing to list individuals by year of graduation date, organized in rough professional groupings as outlined above, since presumably this list is interesting primarily for the sometimes unexpected web of social relationships it reveals.

Case in point: for mathematicians, it is surely much more interesting to see that Elias M. Stein and Peter Lax actually knew each other in high school (anyone know if their Math Team portrait from an old Spectator would be legally uploadable as an image here?) than to have a boring list alphabetized by last name.

About the fact that not all the individuals listed here are suggested (by red linking) as suitable subjects of future wikibiographies: I strongly feel (mathematicians never feel otherwise!) that simply being on the facutly at U.C. Berkeley does not make one notable (sorry for singling out George Bergmann, who I like, as an example, but I think he would probably agree with me on this). In the above, the red links represent mathematicians whose work I knew well enough to be sure they amply deserve biographies in any good large encyclopedia. The others are persons whom I know earned a Ph.D. in mathematics and are in fact professional mathematicians.

This reorganization is a lotta work, so I don't know if I'll finish it all in one go.---CH (talk) 08:04, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

OK, I think I've had it for now :-/ I've pretty much finished the basic reorganization and hope you all like it.
Please note: this is not an exercise in unthinking Stuycruft! I am certainly no rabid inclusionist; for the genesis of my work on this list see User:Hillman/All_the_world's_whatever.
The red links, like Bernard M. Nussbaum do denote clearly notable people (IMO) who do not yet have wikibiographies. But I emphatically demur from any suggestion that the names I left in grey should spawn articles, perhaps in imitation (as suggested above) of similar work by alums of other schools! To the contrary, I plan to follow this up with W:VfDs regarding some of the stubs on less than notable actors and so forth. I think it is absolutely absurd to give equal weight to James Cagney and those whose career screen time is apparently less than one half hour. I also plan to try to blue some links which are currently red (surely) because I didn't try to very hard today to find the relevant articles in cases where I guessed wrong about the title. ---CH (talk) 11:25, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Sloppy title

Shouldn't the title be "List of Stuyvesant High School alumni", not "List of Stuyvesant High School people"? PersonDude 01:38, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it probably should be. RossPatterson 03:57, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
Not necessarily. The other educational institutions use the formatting "List of ..... people"; see List of Princeton University people, List of Massachusetts Institute of Technology people, List of Harvard University people, etc. Plus, we have Frank McCourt on this list, who was a faculty member, not an alumn. A1111 14:38, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Mark Bodenheimer

Mark Bodenheimer was a Stuy grad? I was unaware of this and I am uncertain as to its validity. Remember that this page is only for stuy alumni, a teacher who was notable such as Bodenheimer should not be listed here. Could someone please find evidence of this? Niffweed17 00:46, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Yup, he used to speak of it often, although I don't recall what year he was. Stuyvesant has often had students come back as teachers, and in the early 1970s there were several who made a point of reminding us that they had done this work so we could too. I remember Donald Sussman (Biology) too - class of '65, I think. RossPatterson 04:31, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Chris Rock

Other than some apparent confusion in web biographies with the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn (which is reflected in Chris Rock), there doesn't seem to be any evidence that Chris Rock attended Stuyvesant High School. Some of these bios refer to a "Bedford-Stuyvesant High School", but there isn't any such school. There is a good chance that Rock attended Boys' High School or its successor Boys and Girls High School, which is located in Bed-Stuy. I tried several times to confirm the Stuyvesant connection, but to no avail. He was removed on 17:21, 14 December 2005 by an anonymous editor from Brown University, but I would have done it sooner or later myself. I'm going to remove him again, but if someone can cite a reasonbly authoritative source I'd love to be proved wrong. RossPatterson 17:06, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] stuy userbox

Greetings,
Consider adding the Stuy userbox, {{User Stuy}}.
Regards, - the.crazy.russian (T) (C) (E) 19:34, 26 March 2006 (UTC) (Class of 99)

[edit] Proposal

I propose deleting every name from this list that does not have an article. This means that unless the names are linked, and are blue links, they are gone. If we don't have an article on them, then we have not established notability that they should be listed on this page. User:Zoe|(talk) 21:41, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that's a very good idea. Presence on Wikipedia is not a criterion for notability. You'd be kicking out these obviously notable folks, among others:
  • Neil Grabois (1953) commutative algebra (President, Colgate University)
  • Howard Greyber (1939) astrophysics; former Deputy Director ONI, (Princeton University and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, retired)
  • Marshall Rosenbluth (1941) theory of liquids, fusion; Enrico Fermi Award, National Medal of Science (UC San Diego, emeritus)
  • Leo Sartori (1945) high energy physics, relativity; negotiator for SALT II disarmanent talks (University of Nebraska)
  • Nicholas P. Samios (1949) Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award (director, Brookhaven National Laboratory)
  • Andrew Streitwieser, Jr. (1945) organic chemistry, textbook author; elected in 1969 to the National Academy of Science, Sloan Fellow, Guggenheim Fellow (UC Berkeley)
  • Gary Felsenfeld (1947) physical chemistry, elected in 1976 to the National Academy of Sciences (National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases at NIH)
  • Socrates Litsios (1952) epidemiology; directed malaria eradication campaign (WHO, retired)
  • Michael Silverstein (1962) linguistics MacArthur Fellow, 1973 National Academy of Sciences
  • Hans M. Mark (1947) aerospace engineering; served as Deputy Administrator of NASA, and Secretary of the U. S. Air Force
  • Steven J. Wallach (1962) inventor; former chief technology officer of Hewlett-Packard
  • Steven Rothman (1965) computer architecture; codesigner of VAX architecture (DEC)
  • Richard Lary (1965) computer architecture; codesigner of VAX architecture (DEC)
  • Eric Van Lustbader (1964) novelist, author of The Bourne Legacy and Ninja
  • Gary Shteyngart (1991) writer
  • Mace (Morris) Neufeld (1945) Emmy-winning film & television producer (The Hunt for Red October, Clear and Present Danger
  • Bernard Meltzer (1934) radio personality
  • Bernie Brillstein (1948) producer and manager, Emmy
  • Alan Heim (1954) TV/Film editor, Academy Award (All That Jazz); Emmy Award
  • Michael Oreskes (1971) Editor, International Herald Tribune
  • Peter Sammartino (1921) served as Chancellor of Fairleigh Dickinson University
  • John Theobald (1922) served as Chancellor of the New York City Board of Education
  • Joseph Shenker (1957) served as Provost of C.W. Post College
  • Steven Koonin (1968) served as Vice President and Provost of California Institute of Technology
  • Jack Kreindler (1916) restaurateur, founder of 21 Club
  • Jack Nash (1946) chairman of Oppenheimer & Company
  • Saul Katz (1956) president of the New York Mets
  • Herbert Zelenko (1922) U.S. Congressman
  • Eric Holder (1969) law; served as Deputy Attorney General of the United States
  • Herbert Vollmer (1914) was 1924 Olympic Bronze Medalist in Water Polo
  • Leroy Brown (1923) was 1924 Olympic Silver Medalist, High Jump
  • Norman C. Armitage (Cohn)]] (1923) six Olympic fencing teams, 1948 Olympic Bronze Medalist
  • Albert Axelrod (1938) was 1960 Olympic Bronze Medalist in fencing
Surely the criteria for notability ought to include Olympic medalists, Academy Award winners, heads of major educational and research institutions, etc. There was a time when most of these were red-linked to encourage the creation of articles, but someone didn't like the "unfinished" look and removed the links a long time ago. RossPatterson 22:59, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Then create articles about them. User:Zoe|(talk) 00:54, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I would say that the standard should not be: Is this person notable enough for an independent biographical article? The standard should be: Is this person notable enough to merit some small mention in any full treatment of their field of expertise? In that case, we can just link to the article where their involvement is mentioned.--Pharos 00:59, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I have no problem with that, if they are mentioned in the article. User:Zoe|(talk) 01:11, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

FYI, this is a topic of discussion over at the Wikipedia Village Pump. RossPatterson 02:06, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Zoe's proposal fizzled out over at the Pump. The discussion was archived on 2006-06-22 to Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive#List of Stuyvesant High School people. Since it is scheduled for permanent removal on 2006-06-29, I have copied it verbatim below for the historical record.

[edit] Verbatim copy of discussion from Wikipedia:Village pump

There are tons of people on this page which do not have links, which to me indicates that they don't have articles. If they don't have articles, they have failed to establish notability, and should not be on this page. I am proposing deletion of all names from the list that are not linked. User:Zoe|(talk) 21:42, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

At a quick look, several of these deserve links and articles (Steven Weintraub, for example, was a reasonably prominent topologist, and Stephan Maran is a very prominent astronomer); several others are at the level where I would think that in terms of writing about a high school it is exactly appropriate to mention them and indicate the institution with whom they were later associated, but where they don't really merit articles of their own. We don't really want to propagate a ton of stubs on minor but not negligible figures; inclusion in lists like this seems a reasonable way to split the difference. - Jmabel | Talk 22:20, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
But a gigantic list of names with no links looks to me like an attempt at making an end run around notability. User:Zoe|(talk) 22:23, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
I removed the "Siblings" and "Returning alumni" sublists as non-notable. The other lists needs to be trimmed, but I wouldn't rush it. Allow a few days to create articles for some of those people. It's interesting to see where Wikipedia coverage is strong and weak; almost all the writers, musicians, and actors, even the minor ones, have articles, but only a few of the mathematicians do. --John Nagle 00:17, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I would agree with Jmabel, though, that a very different standard exists for persons deserving a place in a high school alumni list and persons deserving a whole encyclopedia article. The question should be: does this person deserve at least passing mention in any full encyclopedic treatment of their area of expertise? If they meet this somewhat minimal but real standard, then I suggest they also deserve to be in an alumni list.--Pharos 00:29, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
Sure, I wasn't planning on doing anything to it for several days. I posted on the article's Talk page, too. User:Zoe|(talk) 00:51, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
(posted after edit conflict) My feeling is that the list should be migrated to 'prominent alumni' and only persons who pass the WP:BIO notability test should be included. One by-product of allowing full alumni lists is that we open the door to essentially including in Wikipedia the name of every person who has ever attended an institution that has an article in Wikipedia, which might equate to a significant % of the population of the industrialized world (I'm feeling some BEANS coming on ...). There are a couple of notations in WP:NOT that bear considering here. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

As I noted on the talk page before finding out this was being discussed at the Pump,

I don't think that's a very good idea. Presence on Wikipedia is not a
criterion for notability.  You'd be kicking out these obviously notable
folks, among others:
...
[list omitted for brevity, see the talk page for details]
...
Surely the criteria for notability ought to include Olympic medalists,
Academy Award winners, heads of major educational and research institutions,
etc. There was a time when most of these were red-linked to encourage
the creation of articles, but someone didn't like the "unfinished" look
and removed the links a long time ago.

As WP:BIO points out, the criteria for notability include:

  • The person made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in their specific field.
- Like the VAX designers, the Colgate University president, the editor of the International Herald Tribune, ...
  • Political figures holding international, national or statewide/provincewide office or members of a national, state or provincial legislature. (For candidates for office, see Wikipedia:Candidates and elections.)
- Like the Secretary of the Air Force, the Deputy Attorney General, the US Congressman ...
...
- Like Bernard Meltzer, in his day.
  • Sportspeople/athletes ... at the highest level in mainly amateur sports, ...
- Like the Olympics.
...

Just because there aren't articles on these folks yet doesn't mean they aren't notable. It just means that Wikipedia isn't finished yet. RossPatterson 02:09, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

This makes no sense. Notability is a requirement for an article. Since when is notability a requirement to be mentioned inside an article? WP:BIO refers to guidelines for people to merit their own article, not for mention in another article. If we change the word "notable" in the article to "prominent" or some other word, would that make things more acceptable? I would not be in favor of reducing the list to meet the Wikipedia Notability guidelines. (If there is Wiki policy that concerns "notability" of items inside articles or lists, please post specific links and quotes. Someone above mentioned some items in WP:NOT. Please be more specific). Simon12 02:46, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

In the past, AfD has deleted such articles as "List of bands from x" because it was an intent to create notability via Wikipedia for bands which did not pass muster via WP:BAND. Why shouldn't "List of people from x" have to meet the WP:BIO criteria? User:Zoe|(talk) 16:21, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't know the specifics of the AfD cases, but I don't think there is any intent here to "create notability" for these people, so I'm not sure your example applies. I would agree with what Jmabel wrote above: "...I would think that in terms of writing about a high school it is exactly appropriate to mention them and indicate the institution with whom they were later associated, but where they don't really merit articles of their own".Simon12 02:10, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
I agree with both Zoe and Simon12 on this point. A list like this could seem to be an attempt to avoid notability criteria, as Zoe says. But I believe Simon12 is right that this is not such an attempt. The list is indeed large (220 or so names), but if you read the history, I think you'll see that it is policed very well, that names don't get added very often, and that most who are added are quickly removed for non-notability. RossPatterson 03:03, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
I mentioned WP:NOT (it was requested I add some detail to this mention). I'm thinking of the sections related to not creating things like 'directories' (item 7 under the "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information" section), 'lists of loosely associated topics' (item 2 under the same section), and 'genealogical listings' (item 6 under the same section). On the flip-side, it is mentioned that "Relatively unimportant people may be mentioned within other articles," but I really believe that applies to articles on a topic rather than simple lists. I also respond to Bduke's note below User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:14, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
  • There are people on this list who I am amazed do not have articles. Andrew Streitwieser, Jr. is one. --Bduke 01:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
    • A notable person who does not have an article presently could of course be retained in the list as a red-link; one reason red-links (are allowed to) exist is as a notation that the title is associated with a notable concept that has potential for an article. To make a small clarification to my other comments, I don't think the list should be eliminated; I do think that an alumnus list without regard for notability is essentially a 'genealogical listing' ... I conduct genealogy research and alumni lists for schools are very valuable artifacts, but I don't think they belong here as articles under the present article inclusion policies. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:14, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Let's talk turkey. Of the 220 names on the list, 83 are linked to articles, 132 are unlinked, and 5 link to non-existant articles. Of the 132 unlinked, I had no problem finding criteria in WP:BIO that support 34 claims to notability, just trolling through the list by eye for about 10 minutes (see my post at Talk:List of Stuyvesant High School people#Proposal for the details). Not being a mathemetician or a hard scientist, I can't tell what might apply to the folks in those categories (38 Math, 13 Physics, 5 Chemistry, 12 Life Sciences), but the math and physics lists were re-worked very carefully by Hillman, who seems qualified to know (see his explanation of his rewrite last September at Talk:List of Stuyvesant High School people#Reorganization). In Technology (which I do know something about), there are 14 unlinked names, and I'd say there are a few that ought to go, but no more than 3 or 4. After that, we're down in the low numbers - the foregoing account for 82 out of 98 unlinked-and-not-obviously-notable names.

If you accept as I do that Hillman knows his stuff, I really think we're only talking about a dozen or so names that may not be "notable" enough to deserve articles of their own. That's 5 to 10% of the list. Even assuming that a high school alumni list must be limited to people who could deserve articles (which is in dispute above), that's a pretty small problem. RossPatterson 02:49, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Red-links

There are a lot of people on this list that are either red-linked or not linked at all. Should they even be here? I'm not asserting that these people are as unknown as your average alumnus of any school, but Wikipedia lists are de facto lists of notable subjects, not every possible subject. If we ignore the notability issue, we might as well publish the full class list from every year on here. You know what I mean? So I think we ought to remove any listed individual without an article, obviously with the openness to re-add them once someone writes an article on them. Dylan 01:39, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Read the discussion immediately above for a lengthy back-and-forth on this topic from a few months ago, conducted in a much wider forum than here. Nobody ever responded after my final "Let's talk turkey" comment. I'm perfectly happy to see the links removed rather than have them show in red, but I think the point was made very well that notability and having an article are two completely separate things, and that lack of the latter doesn't mean lack of the former. RossPatterson 03:05, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
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