Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Issy Smith

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 candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 01:38, 29 September 2007.

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Issy Smith

This article is about an obscure yet highly notable subject. The primary editor, SoLando, has done an outstanding job in marshalling very limited reliable source material into an interesting, tightly-written, thoroughly-researched, comprehensive, and well-referenced piece. It became an A-Class article earlier today with unanimous unconditional support. --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 16:45, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support (Disclosure: I have made some minor contributions to this article pre-FAC. Update: And some during it.) --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 16:45, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support looks good, all the I's are dotted and all the t's crossed. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:25, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support. An interesting article that meets the criteria. Cla68 00:08, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support I was one of the 4 peer reviewers of the article and also one of the A-Class reviewers who were impressed with the quality and direction of the prose. I have gone and done a few little WP:MOS fixes such as WP:DASH and WP:MOSNUM with regards to some of the dates. I have only a couple of minor points? Why spoil the article with one red link? ;) make a stub if you please. Also the one sentence that i had a slight query with was the sentence "Smith attempted politics". (Para 2 of Legacy) Could it not be Smith attempted to enter politics or Smith tried to enter the political arena? Something to that effect? attempted politics seems to be wrong somehow. Anyway it is a great article and meets all the criteria as far as i can see. Good work SoLando. Woodym555 14:58, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

• 1. What red link? (he asked innocently). 2. Changed to "tried politics" (which Google likes).--ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 16:20, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Yep rewording looks good (and so does the stub by the way!!! ;) The wording was only the slightest of changes, but it just didn't look good to me. It is a great article. Well done. Woodym555 16:32, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose little--Miwanya 18:39, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Is this about size? It is comprehensive. it does not go into unneccessary detail and it is concise. What exactly is your objection please? We can't improve the article to meet your objections if we don't know what they are. Woodym555 18:44, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, Woodym555. Could you elaborate, Mlwanya? There is no established minimum size; if such a standard existed, it is certain that it wouldn't be strictly enforced if an FAC was demonstrably comprehensive and factually accurate (which this article is). Irrespective of size, the article does meet FA criterion, 1b and 2a being most pertinennt to your opposition. There have been numerous examples of relatively short articles attaining FA status, such as Hurricane Ismael and Hurricane Irene (2005). SoLando (Talk) 21:39, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

There is no mimimum size. As long as the article is demonstrably comprehensive, it meets the criteria. Checking through the sources available, it is clear that this is a comprehensive biography of the life of Issy Smith. Woodym555 22:08, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Given the paucity of original material, I suggest criterion 4 applies: "of an appropriate length ... without going into unnecessary detail". --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 22:49, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support. Despite its size, it is a brilliant article. Kyriakos 23:52, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment. There are a few small things that need to be fixed.
  • Need a citation for the quotation in the lead (per WP:Lead)
  • You might want to wikilink to football, so that people won't get confused as to which variety of football the article means.
  • I don't believe you need quotation marks for ghetto and Second Ypres.
  • Cite your quotations at the end of each sentence, even if several sentences in a row quote from the same source. (In particular, the information about his Victoria Cross citation)
  • Some of the footnotes need to be reformatted. In particular, 11, 14, and 16 refer to books but have no publisher listed and the author's full name is not listed (and they aren't in references). Also, if possible, your citations from newspapers need to list the author of the article, and they need to be consistent on their date linking; some have the dates wikilinked and some do not.

Good luck. Karanacs 13:36, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Done, I think. Are there any specific statements you think still need referencing? --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 16:15, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I added a fact tag in the one place that a sentence had a quote and no citation. If you'll fix that, I'll support. Karanacs 16:55, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. --ROGER DAVIES ^TALK 18:37, 28 September 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 candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.