Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alfred Finnila

Alfred Finnila

Alfred Finnila (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Non-notable civil engineer and Finnish bath owner —teb728 t c 22:02, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of California-related deletion discussions. czar · · 00:00, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. czar · · 00:00, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Business-related deletion discussions. czar · · 00:01, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

• Comment Much of the article makes little mention of Finnila. I'm not sure if Finnila is notable or not but don't be drawn into making assumptions just from the article's length! There's a huge amount of WP:COATRACK in there, along the lines of "Finnila was tangentially involved in X so now I'll spend a couple of hundred words talking about X without mentioning Finnila again." I've trimmed away about half the text as completely irrelevant (for example, a very lengthy description of "Little Scandinavia" that mentioned Finnila only once and only in passing), the long WP:COPYVIO quote from a novel and the three infoboxes taken from other pages. Certainly, if the article is to be kept, it needs much more work. For example, the claim that he was the second-most important person on the Golden Gate Bridge project seems rather overblown: surely, that would be trivial to check with Google, if it were true? I suspect that, if this article were to be trimmed down to be about Finnila alone, there wouldn't be very much left that was out of the ordinary. Dricherby (talk) 00:31, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment Even after your deletions, most of what remains is about Finnila's Finnish Baths and Alfred Finnila's parents. Although the bath house may be notable, I can't find any indication that Alfred Finnila is notable; his article might even fail A7. —teb728 t c 02:02, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Comment Good point: I've now deleted the section that were only about the bath houses. Dricherby (talk) 08:59, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
• Delete. A lot of things he was associated with were interesting and perhaps notable in themselves, but that's not enough to make him notable, due to WP:NOTINHERITED. Qworty (talk) 02:51, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
• Delete. I've not been able to find any real notability. In addition to the WP:COATRACKing noted above, the article also has a tendency to overstate the subject's importance: for example, the phrase "assistant civil engineer of California" sounds almost like the deputy chief civil engineer of the state; in reality, assistant civil engineer appears to be a relatively junior position like assistant professor (and you wouldn't call an assistant professor at UCLA "assistant professor of California"). We're left with somebody who worked on the Golden Gate Bridge, inherited a few bathhouses from his parents and ran a geothermal drilling company which I infer was unremarkable since the article doesn't even give its name. Dricherby (talk) 08:59, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

• Keep article. By deleting, we would promote criteria, based on which countless articles should be deleted. It is one of the purposes of Wikipedia to present the individuals in charge of the building and operating of various "landmark" type projects and businesses. If not presented, Wikipedia would be a much less useful tool for search of information. This article meets the criteria for what is generally accepted as notable in Wikipedia. The article was already improved. However, it can be further improved to better emphasize the significance of Alfred Finnila in relation to e.g. the following key matters:

1. Golden Gate Bridge - in this and other similar projects, there are those who clearly were of special importance and in charge of notably more than others. Such is the case of Alfred Finnila in the construction of the world famous Golden Gate Bridge. During the critical final years of the uplifting of the bridge's main structure, Finnila oversaw all of the bridge's ironing work and half of the bridge's roadwork. Accordingly - precisely for this reason -, The San Francisco Examiner in May of 1982 presented Alfred Finnila as the "Assistant Civil Engineer of California", who was a key contributor for the completion of the Golden Gate Bridge work.

2. Bridge Round House - the Art Deco design of the famous Bridge Round House was completed by Alfred Finnila in 1938, immediately following the completion of the construction of the adjacent Golden Gate Bridge.

3. Finnila's Finnish Baths - Alfred Finnila designed and built the famous bathhouse on San Francisco's Market Street, and he then oversaw its operations as general manager for seven decades. Finnila's was a popular and important element in the history of San Francisco's Castro District. Still shortly before closing its popular Market Street location in San Francisco in the 1980s, Finnila's Finnish Baths - owned and managed by Alfred Finnila - was awarded with the title "The Best" two times in row by the popular bi-weekly and free San Francisco Bay Area entertainment magazine San Francisco Bay Guardian. According to the paper, Finnila's was "The Best Sauna and Massage Parlor" in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1983 and 1984. -- Rubert ABC (talk) 23:48, 28 April 2013 (UTC)