Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Henry Adams (mechanical engineer)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Keep. --PeaceNT (talk) 14:27, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Henry Adams (mechanical engineer)

Henry Adams (mechanical engineer) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

I A7 speedied this once. It's back, with more information and references. But... despite all it says, the notability appears to me to be, at best, marginal. And when you get right down to it, it seems to me to fall below that margin rather than above. A hard call, but at this point I have to still suggest that it be Deleted. TexasAndroid (talk) 14:00, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

• Comment So, to summarize the current references: A biographical dictionary... does not establish WP:NOTE, I would like to know to what extent the Calvert, Ferguson, and Sinclair sources actually talk about him. The history of ASHRAE document just confirms that he served as an officer... for what it's worth, in the blurry charter image, he is listed first of 75 "charter membes" in 1895 (but it helps that the list is alphabetical), with address given as Washington, DC, at least consistent with the current bio. Sourcing too much info from henryadams.com is obviously not recommended. The obituary for his son doesn't seem relevant. So the big question is how much do those three (Calvert, Ferguson, and Sinclair) sources say. I would say this would need to get trimmed down if it is not delete. --Marcinjeske (talk) 17:46, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep. I think that a biography that appears in a biographical dictionary does establish notability, and on that basis I think the references are sufficient. --Eastmain (talk) 18:29, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment Are you sure about that... because in that case I have copies of Who's Who Among American High School Students and Who's Who in Science and Engineering from years back that I would like to OCR into Wikipedia... I would finally have my very own BLP.

I would say listings of certain professions, in this case published by a professional organization (ASME)... do not a NOTE make. I would note that ASME does not list the subject on the online biographies of Mechanical Engineering Biographies Throughout Time. I think if there is notability, it is in those offline sources. --Marcinjeske (talk) 19:42, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

• Comment I have to say I am not seeing notability in the provided and accessible sources. Looking for others is complicated by his common name; a contemporary Henry Adams wrote books on mechanical engineering, but he was British. --Dhartung | Talk 22:28, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
• Delete. The three sources Macinjeske lists do not turn up anything about Adams via the (limited) Google Books search. --Dhartung | Talk 22:32, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep President (and founder) of the major professional organisation in his field. DGG (talk) 00:59, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment he was one of many presidents, and his term was brief. As to founder, that is a very broad definition to include all 75 engineers who payed their dues at the first meeting. No one seems to have noted his role in the founding of ASHVE.--Marcinjeske (talk) 07:37, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

and every one of those presidents will be notable. similarly for all the major national associations of anything. (but agreed, now that I see there were 75 charter members that this by itself isn't sufficient--you';re right on that one. ) DGG (talk) 22:54, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

• Delete Unless Sources Establish Notability He was one of 75 charters members and served one year as president and there is no source for any significant role in founding the society. Besides the web site of his consulting company, there is no source for any of the information except that he was "a heating and ventilating engineer in the Supervising Architects Office" and worked (not alone) on government buildings including Ellis Island and the Capital. Regardless, where are the independent sources? Where are the newspaper articles about this notable person? Where are the third party biographies. In 100 years, no one seems to have bothered to write much about him except for the company he founded and named.--Marcinjeske (talk) 07:37, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

• Keep Sources now show he was credited with designing heating systems for several significant buildings, testified before Congress, and founded a company which has media coverage. I do not agree that the ASHVE presidency contributes to notability. There are a lot of professional organizations, with many years of many leaders. Unless some reliable sources covered a person because of the position. But nevertheless, there is enough for now... although we should make sure that this entry does not get confused with the guy who wrote the mech eng book. --Marcinjeske (talk) 07:10, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

• Comment additional information has been added, which does seem to make the notability clearer. He apparently designed, among other things, the mechanical system for Ellis Island. DGG (talk) 14:27, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
• Keep. The references now in the article are enough to establish notability in my opinion. I would be curious to know what is in the NY Times obituary. I wonder what they considered to be the highlights of his career. The current article, which highlights the offices he held in his various associations, sounds a bit like a resume. It is more interesting to know what he actually did. What was his congressional testimony about? EdJohnston (talk) 17:03, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment having succumbed to that weird Wikipedia phenomenon of getting sucked in by a subject of an article (I placed the original speedy deletion tag when this was just a link to the company, but in the process of investigating notability, I ended up adding references and content to the article), I can address this question. The specific congressional testimony cited was part of an investigation into the costs and performance of the mechanical plant at sites including Ellis Island. I have added the link to that testimony on Google Books, and you can read the article's talk page for more details. As for the obituary, unfortunately the New York Times does not have it available free yet, but you can read a number of excerpt from the obituary on the article talk page. I have made some effort at limiting the resume-ness, but for many professions their organization membership is pretty defining... plus it gives good pointers if someone wanted to research further. In terms of what he did - well, design heating and ventilation systems, and analyze them. For the Feds, he did work on Ellis Island, The Capital, and surely many other structures, then later on the building mentioned in the article. I think though that to delve too far into that would just be mundane... I picked up the hints of some kind of scandal in the congressional testimony, but without media coverage, I don't really have the information to go into that with any kind of fair coverage... regardless, I think we have a consensus against deletion?, so maybe someone would like to close this up? (Mr. Chairman, I would like to call the question?)--Marcinjeske (talk) 05:39, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
    • Adams' was a mature professional in Baltimore before the Great Baltimore Fire of 1904. Because of his service and interest in the compulsory legislation comittee of that group, role as an engineering educator, and stature in his profession, I would expect him to have had some role in the creation of the Baltimore building codes that were demanded following the fire. (Prior to the fire, mechanical engineers at ASHVE and many other groups were involved in efforts to improve the living conditions in city tenemants.) There was a huge building boom in Baltimore following the fire. Buildings after the fire were re-built larger than before, and with modern mechanical systems. --Teda13 (talk) 17:34, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.