Talk:Thomas Brassey

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

	Thomas Brassey has been listed as one of the Engineering and technology good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a reassessment.
January 10, 2008 Good article nominee Listed

This article is within the scope of the following WikiProjects:
Cheshire WikiProject (Rated GA-Class) Cheshire Portal This article is supported by the Cheshire WikiProject, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Cheshire on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can visit the Project Page, where you can join the project, see a list of open tasks, and join in discussions on the project's talk page. GA This article has been rated as GA-Class on the assessment scale. High This article has been rated as high-Priority on the priority scale. WikiProject Biography     (Rated GA-Class) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page. Biography Portal GA This article has been rated as GA-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ] More information about this article... The following comments have been left for this page: Not sure what to rate it. The achievements section can be broken down a bit, or maybe encyclopedified rather than a list, thoguh that's probaby hard to do. I'd say B despite the lack of inline cittations due to some references, but you may want to ask Yannismarou abotu this one.--Wizardman 22:31, 27 January 2007 (UTC) (edit) WikiProject Trains, in UK, in Scotland (Rated GA-Class) Trains Portal Sel week 9, 2008 This article is within the scope of WikiProject Trains, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to rail transport on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. See also: WikiProject Trains to do list GA This article has been rated as GA-Class on the quality scale. (assessment comments) High This article has been rated as high-importance within the Trains WikiProject. This article is within the scope of WikiProject UK Railways. High Importance: high within UK Railways WikiProject. This article is within the scope of WikiProject Transport in Scotland. High Importance: high within Transport in Scotland WikiProject. WikiProject Civil engineering     (Rated GA-Class) Engineering Portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject:Civil Engineering, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of civil engineering. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page. GA This article has been rated as GA-Class.
This article has an assessment summary page.

An entry from Thomas Brassey appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on 27 January 2007.

[edit] GA Review

Thomas Brassey has been languishing for too long in GAN.

Please give me a day or two to get my thoughts together before I offer my review. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 21:45, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Having now looked through the article in some detail, I've only got a few small points really:

• "Following the success of the early railways in Britain, the French wanted to build railways ..." seems to read a bit awkwardly to me. What about something like "the French were encouraged to develop a railway network"?
  • Agree. Done
• "Stephenson went with Brassey to a quarry in Storeton, a village near Birkenhead. Following that meeting, Stephenson ..." seems to imply that the quarry meeting was the trigger for the suggestion to tender. Was it?
  • I have re-read Walker and he says that it was. Text revised.
• "... assisting the surveyor of the road, a Mr. Penson". The a Mr. seems strange. Is the surveyors' name relevant?
  • The name is superfluous - deleted.
• "The Harrison children had been taught to speak French, while Thomas himself was unable to do so. Therefore when the opportunity arose to apply for the French contracts, Maria encouraged Thomas to bid for them". This seems on the face of it to be a non sequitor?
  • A few words added. Does this resolve it?
• "... with a Mr. Alexander and William Heap". The a Mr. thing again.
  • William Heap (who later founded an engineering business himself) may form the subject of a future article and it would be useful to keep his name available as a link. I do not know Mr. Alexander's first name. Can you live with it as it is?
• Is it worth including the phrase that the ODNB article uses about Brassey, that he died "one of the wealthiest of the self-made Victorians" do you think?
  • Done.

That's just about it. A really nice, well-researched and well-referenced article. I don't think it's worth putting it on hold waiting for these very minor points to be addressed, so I'm going to list this as a GA. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 18:30, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Reading through it again, an extra point has struck me. "Brassey was a major shareholder in the ship and after Brunel's death, he, together with Gooch and Barber, bought the ship and used it, the only ship large enough at the time, to lay the first Transatlantic telegraph cable across the North Atlantic in 1864". Leaving aside the awkward repetition of "ship", I'm still not certain what this is saying. What was Brasseys's involvement with the ship before Brunel died? Did Brassey play any kind of part in laying that first trans-Atlantic cable, or did he just hire out his ship? --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 02:00, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

• I have amended the text and hope it both reflects what the sources say and makes it clear to the reader. I also corrected the reference: I had the wrong page number!

Thanks for the advice and I hope this fully answers the comments. Peter I. Vardy (talk) 15:31, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

More than satisfies the comments. A very nice piece of work. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 16:57, 11 January 2008 (UTC)