Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/James William McGhee

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 no consensus. Sr13 (T|C) 19:47, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] James William McGhee

James William McGhee (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Author will not (or cannot) supply the requested evidence of notability. Dicklyon 02:46, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I am also nominating the following related pages, other family members of the author, with same WP:BIO problem:

Maria Hart (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

George L. McGhee (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) -- late addition after a few of the comments below were entered (shortly after User:Mjmcghee removed the prod tag from it) Dicklyon 21:37, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

• delete James William McGhee. claim to notability is as the inventor of the "non-sew-on drapery hook". Now while I do know what those things are, I don't find their inventor notable. FWIW: google: non-sew-on + drapery + hook = 0 hits; google: no-sew-on + drapery + hook = 0 hits; google "pin-in drapery hook" = 0 hits. Pete.Hurd 03:36, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
• delete Maria Hart. Minor actress, mails WP:BIO#Special_cases:Entertainers by wide margin. Pete.Hurd 03:45, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
• Delete both. Hart had a small role in a Nicholas Ray film, but that's a thin claim to notability. Without third-party sources evaluating the notability of McGhee is nigh impossible. --Dhartung | Talk 05:06, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
• Keep the article on Maria Hart. Per IMDB and the other movie databases, after 9 years as a contract player for MGM in minor roles, she co-starred in 4 pictures and starred in one in 1950-1952. She can be seen featured in the movie posters from her starring role in "Cattle Queen (1951)" at [1] The New York Times review [2] describes her portrayal of a "rather glamorous bleached blond" who "bests Drake in a climactic shootout." Undecided as to keeping the article on James William McGhee pending the patent and invention claims being better documented. Edison 18:43, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
• Keep Google patent found them in a nanosecond. I would love to get a copy of his obituary as a source but can't find yet. I also found a court battle over the patent which describes him and his company. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 21:02, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the existence of the patents or the starring roles were ever in question. The issue is evidence of notability, per the guidelines in wp:bio. Shouldn't any suggestion to keep be accompanied by some kind of answer or source relative to these guidelines? Dicklyon 21:39, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

• Keep James William and Maria Hart - neither famous but both have claims to notability. Delete George L. - unreferenced. Authorship by user:Mjmcghee suggests COI. Wikipedia is not a genealogy site. Comments in User_talk:Mjmcghee (including replying to a bot!) indicate an unwillingness to take an objective view or to enter into the Wikipedia spirit. -- RHaworth 21:54, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Why not help us out by pointing out what are the claims to notability, so that the evidence can be put into the article and the article saved? I don't think a patent counts for this, does it? Or a listing in a movie database? Don't we need significant secondary sources? Dicklyon 04:21, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

• Keep The patent may be only marginally notable, but the movies push her in the realm of happy notability. Coren 23:07, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

It says "With significant roles in notable films." Can we presume then that you judge several of her films to be "notable," even though none have wikipedia articles and therefore have not themselves been evaluated along that dimension? Dicklyon 04:21, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

• Delete all. (I'm the nominator) So far, none of the keep votes have pointed to the evidence of notability that is required to rescue these articles. One mention of an actress name in a NYT article about the film, with text only about the character portrayed, is really not a secondary source about the subject, is it? Dicklyon 04:24, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
• Delete all personal promotion, insufficient evidence of notability. Wile E. Heresiarch 04:27, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
• Keep allI wrote all three articles. I am a visually impaired person and I have attempted to upload as much of the supporting evidence as possible through my scanner reading machine, please tell me if the supporting documentation hasn’t arrived. For Paul Ashley Chase I uploaded an obit from Warner Brothers, For Maria Hart I provided three internet sources, a copy of a Los Angeles Times article and reference to Hollywood Reporter and Varity articles. For James W. McGhee I gave you 5 patent numbers and a reference to the Canadian patent office and reference to a LA Times article dated March 17, 1942. I also uploaded the original copies. For George L. McGhee I provided a copy of an e-mail from the 30,000 member professional organization he founded.

I am not doing this for “personal promotion” as far as I know all of the people above are dead, And most of them died over 40 years ago. Please tell me how this could possibly be for personal promotion. I am engaged in a much larger research project; when I come across interesting and notable facts that I am not going to use I try to give them to someone that can. This is the case with these different articles. I didn’t know your vetting process was so time consuming, If I did I wouldn’t have started this process.Mjmcghee

• Keep both James William McGhee and Maria Hart, which are sourced and make strong claims to notability. Delete George L. McGhee, which doesn't rise to that level of notability, claimed or supp0rted. Alansohn 17:31, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

  Really? Is filing an (invalid due to obviousness) patent a "strong claim to notability"? Pete.Hurd 03:59, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

  The only thing sourced for JW is his inventions; no evidence of notability; why do so many people who comment here seem to be unaware of wp:bio? Similarly with Maria, her roles are sourced, but where's the evidence of notability? There's a section on entertainers at wp:bio; has anyone read it? The author/descendent pretty much states he is doing original research; his uploaded docs are in no case the kind of evidence of notability that's needed to make these articles acceptable according to policy, as I read it. Please correct me if I should be reading the policy differently. Dicklyon 04:13, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

James William McGhee's claim was upheld the following year in a lawsuit he bought against Kirsch Manufacturing Company and his Canadian patent number 246361 (drapery hook) was always upheld. It was common in those days for large corporations to “slap suite” and infringe on small inventors until their legal/financial resources had been depleted. Also jury tampering and payoffs to judges were par for the course in the 1920s, the days of Al Capone. The stakes have always been high in the manufacturing business, Edison tried to keep a lid on his cameras and projectors with no success yet we don’t question his veracity. The ad that I uploaded two days ago was from a 1932 trade magazine so we know he was still publicized as the manufacturer and inventor three years after the lawsuit you reference. In addition we also know that his Canadian patent didn’t run out until 1942. The United States has/had full faith and credit with Canada during that time. Another thing that may or may not have crossed your mind is that brass, steal, and aluminum wire is used to create these hooks and rings. In order for a business to be profitable this wire must pass through bending and sharpening machines that spits the hooks out into groups of 25 or 50. These machines are highly complicated and have many moving parts. James William McGhee also invented these machines, so there are probably other patents out there.Mjmcghee 05:21, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the reference to wp:bio I think James William McGhee fits the criteria nicely.Mjmcghee 05:47, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that in general James William McGhee has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record (found in the US and Canadian Patent Office) in his specific field (drapery hardware). Even some of the people that want this article deleted have admitted they have used his invention. James William McGhee was a wp:bio creative professional that we can see through his patents wp:bio originated a significantly new concept and technique for hanging draperies. Mjmcghee 05:44, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Maria Hart is an entertainer with a huge “cult” following wp:bio of people that like campy westerns and offbeat movies with a strong female leads instead of the typical male lead. The melodramatic plots are so melodramatic they are very humorous. I saw Cattle Queen on the Western channel recently. In the Lusty Men she plays the second female lead she co-stars in the movie, this is hardly a small role.Mjmcghee 06:11, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. If this guy is notable, so would millions of others be. DaveApter 16:27, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
• Keep all I have found many secondary references to George L. McGhee founder of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists – this organization has 30,000 members and is over 40 years old, it continues to lobby for laws and ethics in the field and has an extensive web-sight. Maria Hart is all over the web and Wiki has an article on the movie The Lusty Men. James William McGhee has many secondary and primary references on genealogy sights as well as the United States patent office, which I was able to cross reference on-line, and the Canadian patent office, which will only take a second for anyone to cross-reference. I think the people that want these articles deleted should start all over again and reexamine the information out there. The original author may not be as technologically adept as the rest of us and it looks like she/he is visually impaired, so I’m going to give her/him a lot of slack. 69.231.56.34 21:00, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

• Keep all I found many primary and secondary sources on the web; I also reviewed the Wiki notability section and found that all three people fit the parameters for Wiki notability. It seems like there’s some kind of personal animosity or argument going on here. I’ve used the drapery hook and it is obvious that J.W. McGhee contributed greatly to his field. George L. McGhee helped get the first laws in the United States passed in his field and started a professional organization with over 28,000 members. Maria Hart is mentioned on many web-sights and her movies can still be seen. RachelRayHoward 02:43, 6 May 2007 (UTC) — RachelRayHoward (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. User's 1st edit, Pete.Hurd 03:43, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

I have no personal problem with Mr. McGhee adding articles on his family members, but I do wonder why people keep saying that they meet the notability criteria but will not just go ahead and add the supporting references to the articles. If I could find them I would add them myself and save these articles, but since nobody will point out the references I'm inclined to believe that they don't exist, in which case the articles should go. It would be helpful if you could point out, for each individual, what notability criteria they satisfy, and where the evidence is. I would change my vote to keep if you could do that. Dicklyon 06:44, 6 May 2007 (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.