Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Harry McNish

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 06:16, 31 January 2007.

[edit] Harry McNish

Self nomination The carpenter on Ernest Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. One of the more interesting characters, he fell out with Shackleton and was controversially denied the Polar Medal. It's taken a lot of digging to put together a coherent article, but I think it is up to FA standard now. Yomangani^talk 10:27, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose It is boring. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cylonhunter (talk • contribs).

What do you find boring about it? Trebor 16:01, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

It is about a carpenter on Shackeletons ship. Shackeleton is worth making a featured article but this isn'tCylonhunter 17:12, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

That's not a valid or actionable reason to oppose; being featured is about meeting certain criteria, not about having an interesting subject. Trebor 17:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

No one wants to read an article that is not interestingCylonhunter 14:12, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Still no actionable complaints. Trebor 17:27, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

(a) "Well written" means that the prose is compelling, even brilliant. I do not find it compellingCylonhunter 03:50, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Can you give an example of where it is not well written. Compelling in this case means the writing is inherently good, regardless of the subject matter. It does not mean everyone who reads this article will be interested in the subject. Jay32183 05:34, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

• I would like to change to Support Cylonhunter 14:36, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support Written well and referenced well. Excellent work. Jay32183 02:23, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

• Support (for transparency, I peer reviewed it and did minor work). I think this is a great article, combining sources to form an accurate account of a fairly unknown person. Trebor 16:01, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support (and I hope the first guy was kidding); just a couple of comments.
  • The 'early life' section seems misnamed; if he died in 1930, his 1918 divorce isn't that early. Also, the sentence about socialist views pops up a bit abruptly after several sentences about his family.
  • In the 'Endurance' section, you mention that he was one of the oldest members of the expedition but not how old he was when they set out. Yes, reading the lead and doing some subtraction will tell you, but for the ADD crowd, add his age.
  • Is "propellor" an alternate spelling or a typo?
  • "When the pressure from the ice caused Endurance to start to take on water" - awkward.
  • "During his watch one night a small part of the ice floe broke away..." - Maybe it's due to the section break, but I read this and thought, "what ice floe?". Repeat here that the crew was on the ice at the time?
  • Rather sharp jump from the poor cat to the boat-building proposal. Opabinia regalis 02:57, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
    • Thanks. I've hopefully fixed all those now with a little rewording and rearranging. Propellor is indeed an alternative spelling, but I've changed to propeller. Yomangani^talk 09:43, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support Well done! One comment:
  • Despite his efforts during the journey, he had briefly refused to follow orders on the crew's long trek pulling the boats across the pack ice and was one of only four of the crew not to receive the Polar Medal. This seemed a bit odd to me, and I had to reread it. Shouldn't the "was one of only four of the crew not to receive the Polar Medal" immediately follow the "Despite his efforts..." bit? Gzkn 09:33, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
    • Thanks. I'm not sure how you'd rephrase it without making a definite connection between the mutiny and the denial of the medal, and, although that is the popular intepretation for it, Shackleton never stated the reason. Yomangani^talk 09:43, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
    • I have rephrased it anyway. Yomangani^talk 14:01, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support (after making a few very minor tweaks that should be checked). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:38, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks, those changes were fine - I just got sloppy while rearranging. Yomangani^talk 22:40, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support Excellant article.--Zleitzen 18:45, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
• Support per above. Semperf 22:15, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.