Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Dorothy Olsen/archive1

Dorothy Olsen

Featured article candidates/Dorothy Olsen/archive1

Nominator(s): RoySmith (talk) 17:20, 16 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about Dorothy Olsen, who flew military planes during World War II as a civilian member of the Women Airforce Service Pilots, ferrying newly built fighters and bombers from their factories where they were built to their embarkation points to Europe or Russia. I am grateful to UndercoverClassicist for their extensive comments at Talk:Dorothy Olsen and Wikipedia:Peer review/Dorothy Olsen/archive1. RoySmith (talk) 17:20, 16 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Kusma

Planning to review. —Kusma (talk) 23:34, 20 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Did you see this source? There are a few nice anecdotes in there that are not yet in the article.
- I did see that. It's more about WASPs in general; was there some specific item that you think would be useful to add?
  - I'm not sure. It is mostly cute anecdotes:
    - "At the state fair in Salem during the Great Depression, she saw a biplane and spent every cent of the money she had earned picking hops to pay for a ride."
    - "Her daredevil stunts once caused damage to a plane’s front-wheel cowling." because she had been "hanging upside down at the time".
  - Including some of that would add further colour, but certainly isn't necessary.
Lead: clarify that she preferred the P-51 to the P-38 even if she preferred that one over bombers.
40hp Taylorcraft: is that a Taylorcraft B?
- I don't believe I've seen anything which specified the exact model.
  - I think the "40hp" was supposed to specify it; not sure whether that uniquely identifies the model.
WASPs: "Her training began in February 1943, at Houston Municipal Field [..] along with half of her class". Not a fan of the "along" here. Maybe "She begain training in February 1943. Half of her class trained at Houston Municipal Field, the other half ..."?
"Olsen initially hated her training" do we know why?
"She encountered difficulties when her fiancé died" do we know anything at all about him or how long they had been engaged? (Did he do anything other than inconvenience her by dying at an inopportune moment?)
- Nothing that I've found.
"civilian aviation was grounded during World War II" really? Maybe general aviation was, but I think Delta and a few other airlines were operating scheduled civilian flights during WWII.
- Hmmm, I'm unsure what to do here. You're probably right, but the source doesn't say that specifically. I've made it "civilian general aviation", which I think is reasonable even if not strictly supported by the source.
  - The Chinook Observer perhaps isn't the greatest source for the history of general aviation during WW2, so it may be better to cite this from elsewhere.
    - I've done a bit of hunting and haven't found anything definitive about general aviation being grounded during WW-II. The best I've found is a vague and unsourced statement in History of the Civil Air Patrol#World War II: On 8 December 1941, all civil aircraft, with the exception of airliners, were grounded. This ban was lifted two days later (with the exception of the entire United States West Coast) and things went more or less back to normal I'll keep looking, but for now I've put a more generic statement in the article.
"delivering brand new planes from the factory and was one of only 12 women certified for night flight" maybe better not to connect these separate facts in one sentence.
There is a slight abundance of "woulds" in this section.
- I got rid of some of them.

Nice article overall, and she seems cool (I like the photo of her as an old lady with sunglasses). I guess her life outside the WASP episode is so unremarkable that its short treatment does not indicate a lack of comprehensiveness. —Kusma (talk) 23:36, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Other than as noted, I think I've addressed all of your comments. RoySmith (talk) 00:32, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed you have. My remaining comments are not showstoppers, happy to support. —Kusma (talk) 09:23, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Volcanoguy

She grew up on her family's farm in Oregon. Link Oregon?
After training in Texas. Link Texas?
After the war, Olsen retired from flying and moved to Washington state. Washington state can be changed to Washington by linking it to Washington (state).
Dorothy Eleanor Olsen was born in Woodburn, near Portland, Oregon. Link Portland?
Floyd Gibbons's biography of World War I. Link World War I?
In a 2022 interview, she recollected crowded housing, insects, and poor weather. The interview was done in 2010 not 2022; Olsen died in 2019.
Opportunity to keep women pilots flying during World War II. World War II should be linked in introduction first.

That's it for now. Comments welcomed FAC here. Volcanoguy 19:44, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed all those, thanks. RoySmith (talk) 22:32, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Volcanoguy, is there any more to come? Thanks. Gog the Mild (talk) 21:59, 2 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

No there isn't unfortunately. I was going to review more and eventually support this article but after RoySmith's withdrawal on my own FAC I've decided to not support or oppose this on either. Volcanoguy 22:23, 2 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Grungaloo

Marking my spot, will post comments shortly. grungaloo (talk) 19:01, 28 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source review

Ref 1 - all uses good
~~Ref 2/3 - No access so not checked~~
- There's links in the refs to Internet Archive if you want to look at those.
  - Ooh, thanks!
Ref 2- all uses good
Ref 3 - all uses good
Ref 4 - good
Ref 5 - One issue
- [b] - I don't see where "Woodburn Flying Club " is mentioned, I only see a vague "club" reference. Also, it seems that this sentence is actually a quote from her so I'd make sure that's clear in the prose.
  - fixed.
Ref 6 - all uses good
Ref 7 - good
Ref 8 - You cite page 99 inline at one point, but the citation at the bottom only lists pages 102-103. usage is good otherwise
Ref 9 - good
Ref 10 - Small issue
- [B] - It's called the Sixth Ferrying Group personnel book in the text, but the source says it's a yearbook, I'd suggest to use yearbook.
  - Fixed
Ref 11 - good
Ref 12 - good
Ref 13 - good
Ref 14 - good
Ref 15 - Issue
- [A] - I can't find anything in this sentence that this source verifies. I wasn't able to access the WaPo article, but if it covers this off then I'd remove Ref 15 on this sentence.
Ref 16 - good, it's only sourcing Jennings' title right?
- Yeah. I messed up the ref mapping when I inserted that. Fixed now.
Ref 17 - Can't validate, AGF that the WaPo article covers this.
Ref 18 - good
Ref 19 - good

The sources mostly appear to be from good WP:RS (WaPo, NYT, other recognized news outlets). ~~For those I couldn't access, I'm AGF that they check out considering everything else does (minus some nitpicks).~~ The only ones that stuck out to me are the few that are mostly interviews, namely Ref 6. Wikipedia:Interviews is the closest guidance I found, but even if considered a primary source I think it's still good to use. It's mostly her recollections of her life, so pretty uncontroversial stuff. Overall I'd say the source are good minus those few issues I point out above. grungaloo (talk) 22:45, 28 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Prose comments

A petite woman - Ref 1 lists her starting weight (92 lbs), I'd consider replacing this with the actual numbers.
- If you believe the source, she managed to put on 8 lbs to get form 92 to 100 in a week. I doubt that's physically possible, so I'm inclined to think the 92 isn't correct, so safer going with the vaguer "petite", I think.
  - Fair rationale. I'd maybe consider a word other than "petite" though. IMO it feels a bit sexist although I'm sure this is not the intent - we don't use this term to describe men so why use it with women? Maybe try something more factual like "Olsen did not meet the 100lb minimum weight upon entry to the program, so she under embarked on..." or something like that.
    - I changed it to "small", which is guess is more gender neutral.
There were more than 25,000 applicants to the program, of which 1,879 were accepted and 1,074 graduated; Olsen was one of 152 students in class 43-4. - This is missing a source. It seems like Ref 8 and Ref 1 cover it though.
- Hmmm, unless I'm missing something, this sentence and the next few are all cited to ref 8.
  - Ok yeah, I think I got confused during the read. On second look it checks out.
Dorothy Eleanor Olsen was born in Woodburn, near Portland, Oregon, on July 10, 1916, to Ralph and Frances (Zimmering) Kocher, and grew up on the family's small farm.[ - there's a lot of commas here, stylistically I think it would look better broken up into two sentences - one for where/when she was born, another about parents/farm?
- Done (not in exactly that way, but split into two sentences).
She encountered difficulties when her fiancé died; taking time off to attend his funeral put her behind the rest of her class. - I think this semicolon should be a comma since the second clause isn't a complete sentence on its own.
- What comes after is taking time off to attend his funeral put her behind the rest of her class. That seems like a sentence to me, but if you feel strongly about this, I'll change it.
  - On a re-read you're right, the semicolon is good.
a practice shared by other WASPs. - This isn't sourced as far as I can tell.
- The WaPo article (ref 2) says, "Sometimes, before sending a plane off to combat, a WASP would leave a note for its next pilot"
  - I guess it's a stylistic preference of mine then, so not something that would prevent support. IMO having a citation near the end of the sentence but leaving the tail end without one makes it seem like that tail is uncited. Even though the next cite does cover it, it's not immediately evident that that cite covers the tail end of the previous sentence as well. You could consider moving the tail into the next sentence instead, or maybe putting ref 2/3 at the end of the first sentence instead. Again, this is a stylistic preference so no need to change it if you'd prefer not to.
    - I think you're right. This is probably one of those things that's "technically correct, but could be better", so I did that.

That's all I've got. Looks pretty good! grungaloo (talk) 22:45, 28 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support - changes look good. grungaloo (talk) 00:18, 29 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Pendright

Placeholder - back soon! Pendright (talk) 22:36, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Lead'

Dorothy Eleanor Olsen (née Kocher; July 10, 1916 – July 23, 2019) was an American aircraft pilot and member of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) in World War II. She grew up on her family's farm in Oregon, developing an interest in aviation at a young age. She earned her private pilot's license in 1939, when it was unusual for women to be pilots.

Woodburn, Oregon would be more reader friendly

When the United States entered the war, she joined the WASPs where she was a civilian employee of the military.

The U.S. declared war on Japan and Germany on December 11, 1941, but the WASP was not formed as such until August 1943 -> Change the introductory phrase accordingly
a civilian employee of the military -> the Department of Defense (and other sources) confirm that the WASP members were United States federal civil service employees who were attached to the United States Army Air Forces. https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/684700/wasps-were-pioneers-for-female-pilots-of-today-tomotrow/
After training in Texas, she was assigned to the Sixth Ferrying Group in Long Beach, California where she worked ferrying new aircraft to airbases from the factories where they were built.
Add a comma after California
Consider: ferrying new aircraft from factories where they were bulit to U.S. airbases -> gets rid of one where.

After the war, Olsen retired from flying and moved to Washington, where she raised a family and lived for the rest of her life.

Washington state is reader freindly

Funny you should mention that. A previous reviewer asked me to drop the "state", but I've put it back now.

Drop the comma after Washington
where she "married and"

In 2009, she was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal honoring her service during the war.

The medal was awarded to the WASP and she and others were the recipients of it.

Most of the sources say "awarded". In the body have "along with her fellow WASPs", but I think the shorter form is fine for the lead.

Olsen died in 2019, at the age of 103.

Drop the comma after 2019

Early life

Dorothy Eleanor Olsen (née Kocher; July 10, 1916 – July 23, 2019) was an American aircraft pilot and member of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) in World War II.

and " a" member of
"during" WWII

She grew up on her family's farm in Oregon, developing an interest in aviation at a young age.

Could we beef this up a bit more: Did she attend local schools - what high school did she graduate from and when; was she active in school clubs or sports?

None of the sources I've seen give any of those details.

What did she do between high school graduation and getting her pilots lic.?

She decided she wanted to fly airplanes when she was eight, after reading The Red Knight of Germany, Floyd Gibbons's biography of World War I flying ace Manfred von Richthofen.

In the first nine words of this sentence, the word she is used three time?
Drop the comma after eight

Her introduction to flight was when she took a biplane ride at a state fair, which inspired her to take flying lessons;[2][3] the cost of the flight reportedly used her entire savings.[4]

This sentence has four pronouns referring to Olsen without nemtioning her proper name -> Suggest starting the sentence with her proper name and rephrasing to drop at least one pronoun

WASPs

Snce the Olsen story revolves around the WASP, why not tell readers a bit about this organization such as - it was formed by the merging of two similar orgaizations and who were the envolved principals, how many miles did it collectively fly, how much were members paid, number of fatalities etc.
Olsen joined the Woman Airforce Service PIlots (WASPs) in 1943 when the program was created; this was an organization of women pilots who took non-combat flying jobs as civilian employees of the military.

How about a little context here: how did Olsen learn the WASP was recruiting, where did she sign up, how much was she to be paid per month etc?
PIlots -> sp
non-combat -> noncombatan?

Initial training was in the Fairchild PT-19, progressing to the Vultee BT-13, the North American AT-6, and finally to the twin-engine Beechcraft AT-11.[6]: time index 15:10

Drop the first comma & add and then
time index 15:10?

I don't know what you're asking here.

Olsen initially hated her training, but stayed with the program to avoid the embarrassment of dropping out;[8] in a 2010 interview, she recollected crowded housing, insects, and poor weather which made the conditions "pretty primitive".[6]: time index 59:54

but "she" stayed
Change which to that

Despite being sick with a cold on her return, she passed a checkride which included aerobatic maneuvers, allowing her to stay with her class although she struggled to catch up.[8]

Change which to that

She graduated on August 7, 1943[2][8] and was assigned to the Sixth Ferrying Group in Long Beach, California.[10]

Add a comma after 1943

Olsen flew 61 missions for the U.S. Army Air Corps, delivering brand new planes from the factory.

According to this link, U.S. Army Air Corps, the USAAC became the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) on 20 June 1941.

Is the word "brand" necessary?

It's what's in the source. I felt it was important to emphasize how new they were. I've added the "less than a half hour" bit from the source to clarify this.

A typical assignment was to ferry a P-38 or P-51 from Long Beach to Newark, New Jersey, then get a military transport flight to Niagra Falls, New York, where she would pick up a Bell P-63 for delivery to Great Falls, Montana and then return to Long Beach for another trip.

A typical assignment "for Olsen" was
Add a comment after Montana
Niagra -> sp
pickup is one word

When the WASP program ended in 1944, the pilots were discharged at their home bases, with no transportation allowance to get back home.[3]

Add "but" after bases,

After the war

After the war, she married Harold W. Olsen of the Washington State Police Department, and moved to University Place, Washington.

and 'they' moved

Nerve damage from a dental procedure left her deaf for many years but at the age of 80, she received cochlear implants which restored her hearing.

Add a comma after years and drop the comma after 80
Change which to that

This is it for now - Pendright (talk) 22:21, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the detailed comments. I think I've addressed them all in the article, or commented in-line for items I didn't change. Please let me know if I've missed anything. RoySmith (talk) 00:31, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, yeah, I've got a note to add a bit more background about the WASPs. I'll work on that. RoySmith (talk) 00:32, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I gotta love the writing in that DOD web site you pointed me to. "In an interview before her death..." Yeah, that's generally the best time to conduct interviews. RoySmith (talk) 01:17, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've added some basic information about the history of the WASPs. RoySmith (talk) 02:12, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Gog the Mild

Recusing to review.

"When the war began". For many readers this will mean 1939, while I suspect you mean 1941. And did she join before the end of the year or was it 1942. It may be easier to mention Pearl Harbour and then give a specific date.
"of which 1,879 were accepted". "of which" or 'of whom'?
"her fiancé died". Any more detail on this? Ie, was he killed in combat?
Consider moving "Olsen never flew commercially after the war, and not at all after having children. She is quoted as saying, "Why would I want to fly a Cessna when I've flown a P-51?"[1][3]" to immediately after "... and a son, Kim."

After the war feels thin. Ie, was Olsen a full-time mother - would that be 'home maker' in modern American - prior to working with antiques? When did she marry, when were her children born? What did her husband do for a living, what did he do during the war, how did they meet?
Link "flyover". (To flypast.)
"Alta Thomas, Betty Dybbro, and Mary Jean Sturdevant." Do any of these have articles? If not, are any notable enough to merit a red link?
References: article titles - not book titles - should consistently be in sentence case. Regardless of how the original appears.

A smashing article - great work. Gog the Mild (talk) 03:44, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I think I've made all the changes, please ping me if I missed anything. I didn't spot any refs I had mis-cased; was there one (or more!) in particular that you had in mind?

The question about Alta Thomas, Betty Dybbro, and Mary Jean Sturdevant is a tricky one. If you search for them and "WASP", you'll find some material. Largely the same kind of material I found for Olsen, but with a different name. Modulo some personal details, they all have pretty much the same story, as I suppose do the 1,070 other WASPs as well. If you were a woman with a pilot's license in the early 1940s, you were likely to be of the same personality type. So why did I pick Olsen to write about? Only because I saw her obituary in the New York Times and got hooked. If it's OK with you, I'm inclined to skip the redlinks.

Thanks again for the review and the kind words. RoySmith (talk) 16:34, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]