Talk:David "Stringbean" Akeman

Early Life and Career

On more than one occasion, an attempt has been made to correct the redundancy of introducing Akeman's baseball career in two separate paragraphs. This is met with resistance and the redundancy is reinstated by a subsequent editor. Why? It doesn't read better that way and the history is not distorted by holding it back until the fourth paragraph. If someone insists on restoring the original edit, please explain why in this space. Thank you. Rasdock (talk) 21:58, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Story of cash found in 1996 false?

I haven't seen any source for the claim that $20,000 cash was found in the cabin in 1996. A woman commenting here claims it is a false story. http://www.wsmv.com/story/23921086/40-years-passed-since-murder-of-opry-star-stringbean-akeman "There was never any hidden money found. That was staged by someone renting the house. I would know. My parents owned it at the time. Complete fabrication that unfortunately gained notoriety before any attempt to verify." Wondering if anyone has any back-up for the story. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.188.89.180 (talk) 07:27, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I've found exactly one mention of the 1996 cash finding—in AP https://apnews.com/article/63a33a22be1c403a821aa6d105a34d9f from an article about one of the murderers getting paroled. Anachronistic coffee cup (talk) 17:55, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 16 April 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. This was a rather difficult close but both sides seem to have valid arguments. None of the other names suggested also gained a consensus. Yashovardhan (talk) 09:16, 1 May 2017 (UTC)

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David "Stringbean" Akeman → Stringbean (musician) – WP:COMMONNAME; he isn't the primary topic here, but it is a common name. A quick Google search will show that Stingbean is used more than David Akeman (1.07 million to 70,000). Corkythehornetfan (ping me) 23:15, 16 April 2017 (UTC)--Relisting. Yashovardhan (talk) 04:09, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. It depends on the name. Single-name singers such as Adele, Beyoncé, Cher or Madonna (entertainer) have a uniquely-familiar superstar identity, but specialized performers such as Stringbean are either referenced by a full stage name in the manner of Grandpa Jones or by their professional moniker in quotes such as Henry D. "Homer" Haynes and Kenneth C. "Jethro" Burns or child actors Jackie "Butch" Jenkins, Billy "Froggy" Laughlin and George "Foghorn" Winslow. —Roman Spinner (talk)(contribs) 04:14, 17 April 2017 (UTC)
• Support. Looking around, it looks as if "Stringbean" (sometimes "String Bean") really is the name he is most called. AllMusic has him as Stringbean, the Hee-Haw clip chyron has him as String Bean (and not David Ackerman or David "Stringbean" Ackerman) and so forth. You don't have to be superstar to have a mononym (Keith (singer), Oliver (singer), Violette (singer), etc.). Grandpa Jones is titled that because that's what he was was called -- if he was called just Grandpa we would title the article that way. Has nothing to do with Stringbean. He appears not to have been called or known as David Ackerman, much. Herostratus (talk) 23:21, 23 April 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose known as much by his name. In ictu oculi (talk) 09:20, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

OK. Well, let's see. Google Ngrams is not going to help us here, and Google hit numbers mean little, plus "string bean" and "stringbean" are common nouns, so the signal-to-noise ratio is going to be low. So let's see... What claims to be his official site is titled "David Akeman AKA StringBean". It has a video of a TV appearance, and the chyron says just "String Bean". If you go to the CDs section, there are seven CDs for sale. All are presented as being by "Stringbean" (Stringbean - Barnyard Banjo Pickin and so forth). The name David Akeman does not appear on the album covers, or if it does it's too small for me to read, whereas Stringbean appears in large type. The other videos in the video section don't have chyron or give a name... FWIW here the host addresses him as "String"... In certain context, such as his biography, the site uses "David Akeman".

The albums are the deal-maker for me. It gets my attention is that all his albums are presented as being by "Stringbean". It seems that he is presented under that name in his TV appearances also. If he gave a concert, it would be advertised as "Come hear Stringbean!" I would warrant. I get the distinct impression that if you go to the record store and ask for David Akeman's albums, they will not know who you mean. If you tell your friends that you are a David Akeman fan, they will not know who you mean. You have to say "Stringbean".

By the same token, all of Reginald Dwight's albums (and appearances) are presented as being by "Elton John", and so he is mainly known by that name, and for that reason we title his article "Elton John" and not "Reginald 'Elton John' Dwight". Cher and not "Cherilyn 'Cher' Sarkisian". And so forth. I don't see why Stringbean also shouldn't be presented by the stage name he is known by.

I grant that in stories of his murder, or in biographies of his life, he is referred to sometimes as "David 'Stringbean' Akeman" or just Akeman. But so? That's probably true of a lot of performers. What we want is the common name by which he is known to the public. Herostratus (talk) 11:16, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

• Support a move from the current title to either Stringbean (musician) as proposed or to David Akeman per WP:NICKNAME ("...avoid [for example] adding a nickname, or a contracted version of the original given name[s], in quotes between first and last name."). —  AjaxSmack  17:56, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Birth date wrong?

Here, the birthdate says "June 1915", but in the linked article, he's said to have been born July 4, 1916: https://www.tennessean.com/story/entertainment/music/2014/10/15/peter-cooper-1973-killings-brought-fear-to-nashville/17306095/ Dpm12 (talk) 01:21, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

PeerReview

2. The article gives a lot of information, but said information needs to be a little more fact checked. I noticed a previous comment mentioned that there are conflicting birthdates, and the change has not been made yet within the article. There could also be some more references and in text citations added. There are only two references right now, and with some of the 'factual' information within the article being wrong, it would be helpful to find more references to do some fact checking with. With the large amount of information given, it would be helpful to have more references to prove that the information is without a doubt accurate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by StringBassPlaya (talk • contribs) 17:40, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

birthdate

In the book "Kentucky Country: Folk and Country Music of Kentucky" on page 125 it stated "Though most histories give Stringbean's birth as 1915, His brother Robert has checked the family bible and has confirmed it was 1914". I'm not sure how to go about using a book as reference so I'll just put it here and if anyone wants to check it out and change it, feel free. you can find a screenshot of the book and page in question at https://books.google.com/books?id=ZJIfBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA125&lpg=PA125&dq=string+bean+birth+year&source=bl&ots=NGua1Wu58t&sig=ACfU3U3v-xCkooMofl1EOGcZhS9xR1HfNg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiu1f_qi67oAhXL854KHQMXAGAQ6AEwEHoECBYQAQ#v=onepage&q=string%20bean%20birth%20year&f=false 63.140.72.227 (talk) 12:45, 22 March 2020 (UTC)