User talk:Ammodramus

Earlier material:

• /Archive 1 (discussions re. 19th-century English lit)
• /Archive 2 (discussions re. William Steele, Frank Lloyd Wright)
• /Archive 3 (discussions inactive since about July 2010)
• /Archive 4 (discussions from about Sept-Dec 2010)

Just wanting to check — is the Kearney article right in saying that it's Central Time? My job has me on the phone a lot; I called a place today in Kearney (Ramada Inn, if I remember rightly), and my computer's database said that it was Mountain Time. Nyttend (talk) 18:35, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Central Time is correct. In southern Nebraska, the dividing line cuts off the westernmost counties; so Dundy, Chase, and Perkins counties are on Mountain Time, and everything to the east is on Central Time.

--Ammodramus (talk) 19:45, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! The map I have must be wrong, because it shows the dividing line going through the central part of the state (if I remember rightly, significantly farther east than it shows the dividing line through Kansas), and never having been to Nebraska, I couldn't know from experience. Nyttend (talk) 21:33, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I see that you're going through the Commons categories for Nebraska buildings and replacing "Category:Built in the United States in (year)" with "Category:Built in Nebraska in (year)".

Is this something you'd like help with? If so, and if there's a useful way to split the work, let me know.

--Ammodramus (talk) 03:28, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sure thing, if you want! It's not just Nebraska — I've gradually been putting all images from "Category:Built in the United States in (year)" into state-level categories: when I'm done with it, each year's "Built in the United States" category will have only four types of subcategories: bridges built in that year, churches built in that year, houses built in that year, and state-level categories. I'd give you an example, but for some reason I can't access Commons tonight. If you want to create one or more year categories, please note that they are created with a template: most of them are {{StatenameArc|###|#}}, where the # characters are the year — e.g. Nebraska in 1987 would be {{NebraskaArc|198|7}}. A few states have less capable templates (Alabama and New York come to mind), so if you create any categories and find that they don't look complete, you'll do well to check other years' categories for that state. Nyttend (talk) 04:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Will work on that. Unfortunately, in the last hour or so I've found a new problem to deal with. Back in December and January, Commons:User:AnRo0002 decided to start recategorizing Commons:Category:Bridges in Nebraska; then he apparently got bored with that, and is now recategorizing German paintings. I am, frankly, somewhat miffed—and I apologize for venting at you, but my German is much too weak to unload on the real culprit. Anyhow: will be working on straightening out that mess, and in the course of so doing will include Category:Built in Nebraska in (year). If you run into any Nebraska bridges in the course of your efforts, you might leave them for me, since I'll have to go through the entire category bridge by bridge anyhow. Once I'm done with the bridges, I'll try to help out with the Nebraska buildings.

--Ammodramus (talk) 04:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have worked through all of the "(decade) architecture in Nebraska" categories, and think I've taken care of them all. That's 2% less work for you... --Ammodramus (talk) 23:54, 1 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delighted to see you at WikiProject Nebraska. The project's been awfully inactive lately; it'd be nice to see it re-activated.

I see that one of your interests is family-history research. Is this on your family specifically, or genealogies generally? If the latter, I wonder if I could ask you for advice.

I've just written an article on A. T. Hill, a Nebraska archaeologist. In the course of it, I've run into a couple of minor problems. The first is that I've got two sources that conflict on the number of Hill's siblings: one says that he was one of four children, the other that he was one of six. The second is that I've got the name of Hill's wife, but I can't find the date of their marriage.

Could you by chance direct me to an online genealogy site that doesn't require registration, payment, etc., and that might help me answer these? They're not critical for the article, but I'd like to include them, and to include them accurately. Thanks—

--Ammodramus (talk) 03:33, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the friendly greeting! (I've received a few less-than-friendly ones so far, but that's water under the bridge.) It's true, I live in Omaha and have plenty to write about Nebraska. Specifically, I've been, and still am, involved in the Mid-America Council of Boy Scouts. The scout camp articles could do with some improvement, though finding sources to match the campfire stories will be fun... But it's worth it.

It's true, genealogy is a passion. I've been researching my own ancestors with some moderate success using a combination of http://records.ancestry.com and http://familysearch.org . The first has some nice information if you can provide a name for what you're looking for, cobbled, I presume, from the trees on the site. I love the site just for the ease it provides me when organizing all that data. Familysearch, if you haven't heard of it, is run by the LDS family history center. I've never found a more generally helpful site for free.

Last, I recommend the almighty google search. searching: +"A T Hill" +Nebraska +birth, or something of that variety might yield some names and numbers. I found a few surprising tidbits, presuming that I wanted info on noteworthy relatives. Come to think of it, there are a few ancestors who could stand their own article. A fine idea! Thank you, sir Mr. Kent (talk) 23:58, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the reply. Familysearch has yielded some useful results, which I've incorporated into the Hill article.

I spent a little time on websites for the Mid-America Council not too long ago, while writing the article on Pahuk. Eventually, I decided that the Pahuk Pride event was named after "pahuk", the general Pawnee word for "bluff", and not for Pahuk, the specific bluff near Cedar Bluffs, Nebraska.

If you're working on articles about Nebraska, I've got a camera and have taken and uploaded a lot of photos to illustrate Nebraska articles. (I'm not a great photographer, but I can generally get something acceptable to illustrate a town or a building or the like.) If there's something in particular that you'd like photographed, drop me a note and I'll try to get it. I can't promise quick results; but I do a lot of travelling, so I hit most parts of the state at least once a year.

--Ammodramus (talk) 01:51, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is the part where most of my knowledge comes from stories that need some digging to sort out. From what I've been told, Pahuk (alternately spelled "pohawk") is a sacred Indian area, located near the platte river. Pahuk Pride, the leadership camp of which i am a staff member, is indeed named for the legend of Pahuk. The legend is incorporated in several ways. It consists of a comingofage warrior who meets spirits in a cave in the shapes of a bear and snake. These symbols are incorporated into the Logo for Pahuk Pride. Also, the legend of Pahuk is central to Kit-Ke-Hak-O-Kut, lodge 97 of the BSA national honor society, Order of the Arrow. Lodge 97 was originally named the Pahuk Lodge, for these very same legends. As such, there is a place named Pohawk Point at Camp Cedars near Cedar Bluffs, NE. The OA buildings for the Camp are located here. This is all off the top of my head, I may do a little research on the subject. Mr. Kent (talk) 04:30, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(To EnglishTea4me) Have been following with interest your edits to Willa Cather. It looks as though you've improved the article considerably. Before you started on it, it wasn't especially well-organized, and had a number of significant holes. You've already done a great deal to remedy those.

Unfortunately, I know too little about Cather to make useful contributions to the article. However, should you find yourself wanting to illustrate it or other Cather-related articles, I might be able to help. I am based in Nebraska and own a camera, and took most of the pictures at Commons:Category:National Register of Historic Places in Webster County, Nebraska. If there are specific photos you'd like taken in the Red Cloud area, please feel free to leave a note at my talk page and I'll try to oblige.

--Ammodramus (talk) 20:27, 16 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Ammodramus, and thank you for your remarks and offer to provide photographs. I've seen some beautiful photos of the Cather Memorial Prairie, but unfortunately they're copyright protected; in any case, I do not know how to upload them. I can edit text, but I'm lost when it comes to uploading photos. Setting is such an integral part of Cather's writing that photos of the Nebraska prairie near Red Cloud would be a wonderful addition. I've also started editing the article on Cather's story "Neighbour Rosicky" -- it needs a lot of work, too -- and a photo of the Nebraska prairie would go nicely with that as well. I look forward to seeing your work, at your convenience, of course -- and thank you again. (This is the first message I've answered on Wikipedia, so I hope I'm doing it correctly). EnglishTea4me 01:20, 17 March 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by EnglishTea4me (talk • contribs) [reply]

I've only been editing for about a year and a half, so I have no business acting like an old WP hand, but...

Your response came through nicely. If you won't take it amiss, though, I'll make a couple of suggestions. First, if you place a colon at the beginning of a paragraph, it indents the paragraph. Each additional colon indents it a bit more. This makes it easier to see who's writing what on a talk page, especially in situations where a number of people are chiming in. Second, it looks as if you typed out your username and the date and time by hand. You don't have to do this: just type a string of four tildes, and it will produce your signature automatically. (If you forget to sign, Wikipedia will automatically add your signature, but with a snippy little remark to the effect that your comment was unsigned—which is why I think you didn't use the four-tildes trick.)

Photos. Pictures at Wikimedia Commons are available for use on all the Wikipedias. Commons is arranged in categories and subcategories. If you'll follow the link in my original message, it'll take you to a category of NRHP sites in Webster County, Nebraska, many of which are Cather-related. Click on any subcategory that interests you; click on pictures or on the filenames under them to see them in a larger size. If you want to leave a category, its parent categories are listed below; click on any one of them to return to that parent.

Once you've found a photo that you think you want to use, you can insert it into the article. The method's described at WP:IMAGES. I've inserted a photo into this comment, so you could see how it's done:; the code was inserted right before the previous paragraph. If you click "Edit" for this page or subsection, you should be able to see it. Two square brackets, followed by the name of the Commons file (including the initial "File:" and the final extension, e.g. ".jpg". Follow that with a pipe ("|") and "thumb" (very important, since otherwise the picture will appear full-sized), then another pipe. After that, I like to put "alt=" and then a short description for those who can't see the photo; this isn't required, but it's a good idea. One more pipe, followed by the caption; and then a pair of close-square-brackets.

It usually takes me a bit of trial and error to place the photo. I think you've got to put the code between two paragraphs.

If you're interested, by the way, the Nebraska State Historical Society's "Nebraska National Register Sites in Webster County" site has a short account for each site; if a site's Cather-connected, it generally explains what the connection is. (I see that the Pavelka farmstead, which I haven't photographed yet, is connected to "Neighbor Rosicky"; I'll try to shoot that and upload it in the near future.)

Hope that this is useful to you; please feel free to drop me a line if you've got a question that you think I might be able to answer. I apologize for the length of this comment, and hope that the content is worth it—

String of four tildes, which turns into: Ammodramus (talk) 02:36, 17 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As a newbie, I appreciate all suggestions, advice, etc. I did sign my message with four tildes, but for some reason my signature came out as if I had typed it instead of as a blue link. I must have done something wrong, but what that is I don't know. We'll see what happens this time.

I have two questions that you can probably answer: 1)When you respond to a message, do you write it on the other user's page? That's what I'm doing? 2)Do you respond in Edit mode? I can see no other way of responding. I'm assuming that if I clicked on the New Section tab at the top (between Edit and View History) it would be to introduce a new topic.

Photos of the Pavelka farmstead will work beautifully with "Neighbour Rosicky" and for the My Antonia article since Cather based Antonia, at least in part, on Annie Pavelka.

Thanks so much for your help and advice.EnglishTea4me 15:25, 17 March 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by EnglishTea4me (talk • contribs)

Happy to be of assistance. My own career as an editor was greatly helped along by a more experienced Wikipedian, who displayed immense quantities of patience and forbearance in answering my questions and correcting my errors.

I'm perplexed by your signature problem. The four-tildes trick has never failed for me. I assume that you're getting your tildes straight off the keyboard and not using some kind of insert-symbol thing. For what it's worth, what would happen if you copy-and-pasted this string of tildes? ~~~~ (I kept them from turning into a signature here by bracketing them with the "nowiki" command; but when I copy-and-pasted them and then looked at the preview, they turned into my signature.) If that doesn't work for you, then I'm stumped—something weird with your browser?)

Regarding user talk pages, you're going about things in the usual fashion. Editing the talk page is the correct way to leave a message. (It's a Wikisolecism to remove or alter content from another person's talk page, even if you originally put it there. You can do what you like on your own, including deleting or archiving material.) Talk-page dialogue usually proceeds in the way that we're conducting it: I leave a message on your talk page; you respond on mine; I reply on yours; &c. If I'm writing someone else, I'll often put a copy of my message on my own talk page, so that I can see the whole conversation in one place; but that's a matter of choice.

I'll be in south-central Nebraska before too long, and will try to get the Pavelka place. Will leave you a note when I do. For now, please let me know if there's anything in particular that you'd like photographed (or re-photographed). This isn't the best time of year for landscapes, since the snow's mostly melted and the new green hasn't come in yet; but it's good for buildings, since they aren't hidden by foliage.

--Ammodramus (talk) 19:33, 17 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I tried copying-and-pasting the four tildes you provided, but that didn't work. Thank you, though, for the trouble you went to. And, yes, I am using the tildes straight off the keyboard. Now I bet you're wondering how I corrected the problem. I entered my signature in wiki code. That gives me the sig. and a link to my talk page. I followed that with five tildes, and that gives me the time stamp. Nice to have that problem out of the way. Now I can concentrate on more interesting things. If I ever find out what the problem is, I'll let you know.

Re: photos. It occurred to me, too, that it might be too early in the year to photograph landscapes. Photos of the Pavelka farmstead will work well with several articles. Also, have you photographed the Red Cloud Opera House? It's featured in several Cather novels and is currently home to the Willa Cather Foundation (another article I plan to work on eventually). Photos of the Opera House could come in handy.

--EnglishTea4me (talk)18:16, 18 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think I've got photos of the opera house, in a folder full of downtown-Red-Cloud photos waiting to be edited and described and uploaded. I'll try to expedite the process and get them up soon. Ammodramus (talk) 00:52, 20 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I looked at the editing history of the Willa Cather Foundation article, and there was a photo of the opera house at one time, but it was taken down, no doubt due to copyright issues. I think a photo of the opera house would work well on that page, too, especially since that's where the Cather Foundation is housed. EnglishTea4me (talk)17:30, 22 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've got a photo of the opera house edited and ready to go; but for some reason, I'm not able to get photos to upload on this computer at this time. I'll try to get it up tomorrow, and will drop you a line when it's available. Ammodramus (talk) 01:15, 23 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Photo of the opera house is uploaded and in Commons:Category:Opera House (Red Cloud, Nebraska). It's not considered proper to construct a category for a single photo; but I might try for some interior photos on my next trek to Red Cloud. I'd also like to see if I can catch it without the cars parked in front. Ammodramus (talk) 04:30, 24 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Belatedly, ever so belatedly, I've got over to Webster County and photographed the Pavelka farmstead. Photos are in Commons:Category:Pavelka farmstead (Webster County, Nebraska); I hope you'll find some of them useful. --Ammodramus (talk) 02:28, 1 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I wanted to make sure you got my message. I replied to your question in "Talk:Fairfield,_Nebraska#Photo", and wanted to make sure you were aware of this. Thank you. Silverojo (talk) 14:02, 24 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Got your message. Thanks for the note; as it happens, I have the Fairfield article on my watchlist, so I'd have seen your comments and edits anyhow. (If you're not familiar with the watchlist, it's a good way to monitor pages for changes; you can add and remove pages from it manually, or you can set "My preferences" so that every page you edit is automatically added to it.)

And, while I'm dispensing advice: Notice how this comment is indented from the one above it. That's done by putting a colon at the beginning of each paragraph (you can see it in this case if you switch into edit mode). Additional colons produce additional indentation, and that makes it easier to keep track of who's saying what in a talk-page discussion. (I've edited the talk page for Fairfield to indent your response from my original comment; if I add something further, I'll put two colons in front of it to indent it even further.)

Now, to your remarks re. the Fairfield photos. I'm afraid I have to chide you a bit on your assumption that I was vandalizing the article. One of the core tenets of Wikipedia is "Assume good faith". Of course, there are situations that're clearly vandalism, but if there's any room for doubt, WP:FAITH. That goes double if the editor in question has a record of non-vandalism. If you'd checked my user contributions (click on "Ammodramus", then find "User contributions" under "Toolbox" at left), you'd have seen that I've contributed a great deal of non-vandalizing content to articles on Nebraska, including adding photos to the articles on several hundred Nebraska towns. Moreover, from my first reversion of your edit, I added an edit summary, which isn't the usual practice among vandals. When I saw your removal of the photo without an edit summary, I was inclined to suspect vandalism on your part; however, when I checked your user contributions, I saw that you'd made useful contributions in the past, so were probably not engaging in deliberate vandalism this time.

I have to disagree with "it is not good etiquette to remove someone else's photo and replace it with your own. ADDING a photo to the page is one thing, but removing my photo was inappropriate. In the future, please refrain from removing other people's images from Wikipedia entries." From the standpoint of Wikietiquette, changing or removing a photo is no different than changing or removing text. As with text edits, one should add an edit summary, and the change is of course subject to discussion, reversion, further changes, etc.; but there's no presumption that the original photo is necessarily the best one.

I'll justify my photo change at the article's talk page. Thanks again for the note letting me know about your comment there. I hope you don't mind my offering you advice; my hope was to help and encourage you, since we need more editors working on Nebraska, especially outstate Nebraska, subjects.

--Ammodramus (talk) 17:21, 24 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:Ken Gallager) I see that you've recently been adding lengths to rivers in Nebraska. If it wouldn't be too much trouble, could I ask you for a few river lengths?

• I've tried in vain to find a source for the length of the Keya Paha River, which is a tributary of the Niobrara.
• The current article on the Loup River only treats of a short length, below the junction of the North and Middle Loup; it has redlinks for the three branches, North Loup River, Middle Loup River, and South Loup River. I think this is a mistake: that the whole system should be treated in a single article. That expansion of the article is on my to-do-one-day list; it would help very much if I knew the lengths of the three branches, as well as having a source for the length below the junction.
• There's presently no article on the Cedar River (Nebraska), which flows into the Loup in Nance County, Nebraska; or on the Calamus River, which flows into the North Loup in Garfield County, Nebraska. Writing those articles is also on my one-of-these-days list.

I'd very much appreciate your calculating these lengths and, in the case of the unwritten articles, leaving them in a note at my talk page. If this'd be a lot of work, please feel free to decline my request. I've tried to figure out how to use the Nat'l Hydrography Dataset for myself, after reading the discussion earlier on this page; but it apparently calls for more GIS skills than I've got (which are approximately none). Thanks--

Ammodramus (talk) 18:54, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hi - Here are the lengths I've gotten for the Loup River and its branches. The National Hydrography Dataset (I source it as "U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. The National Map, accessed March 30, 2011") gives 111.4 kilometres (69.2 mi) for the main stem of the Loup River, close enough to the figure in the article that it's not worth changing. The North Loup is 435.8 kilometres (270.8 mi) long, the Middle Loup is 351.8 kilometres (218.6 mi) long, and the South Loup is 356.2 kilometres (221.3 mi). You would think the South Loup would be quite a bit shorter, but it appears to do the most winding of the three rivers. Also, here are the three branches of the Middle Loup River: North Branch Middle Loup = 91.1 kilometres (56.6 mi), Middle Branch Middle Loup = 86.4 kilometres (53.7 mi), and South Branch Middle Loup = 77.3 kilometres (48.0 mi). I'll send another message (maybe tomorrow) with the lengths of the other rivers. --Ken Gallager (talk) 19:59, 30 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Here are a couple more for you. The Cedar River (Nebraska) is 145.1 kilometres (90.2 mi) long, and the Calamus River is 188.5 kilometres (117.1 mi) long. The Keya Paha will be coming soon. --Ken Gallager (talk) 12:51, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If you remember last summer I took a trip from Philly to Denver and got a few NRHP photos in Nebraska. This year I'm doing the same trip again, but will basically be following US 30 the whole way (maybe as far as Cheyenne, WY if I have the time). I'll be in Nebraska either the 2nd and 3rd, or the 3rd and 4th. If there are sights along the way that you would especially like me to snap, please let me know. It's a long shot, but if you wanted to meet somewhere along the way ... In any case, I'll do my best to make sure that all the NE nrhp lists are not completely Ammodramus photographed. Smallbones (talk) 00:51, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the nice comments. I really enjoyed Nebraska, both west-bound and east-bound. Timing of course was more up to making progress down the road than to getting the sun in the right place. I guess you've probably realized that I'm really more into playing the game of a scavenger hunter, rather than being a real photographer, so I have no objection whatsoever to you taking good photos and replacing mine :-) It's the thrill of hunting down the wild Buffalo County that keeps me going! I think I'm done with my Nebraska uploads, but only 40% done with all the uploads from the trip. You never know, I might find another Nebraska city or town hidden in the files! I haven't gotten close to cleaning out and organizing all the literature (brochures, etc.) from the trip. I know that I should write up or at least start a few articles, but that's a lot harder than just taking a few snaps.

A couple of potential articles that do have my interest however are Deadwood Draw (near Sidney) which actually does have an article on it started - something like "Sidney to Deadwood pack trail." I hadn't really run into wagon ruts before and couldn't figure out if I really wanted to photograph them (or how to ...) Another involves Harmon Park in Kearney. Just by accident I ran into the lady who wrote up the NRHP application who is now chairperson of Kearney Area Preservation Society. I may have even promised that I'd write up the Park article. If you e-mail me I can provide contact details. It seems to me that the entire county list should be fixed up, de-red linked, etc. and made into a featured list. I'm sure that we (I'm being optimistic) would have her full cooperation.

Any help or more compliments are always appreciated. All the best. 19:20, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Regarding photos: I'm based in Kearney and do a lot of photography to illustrate articles on Nebraska, particularly outstate, and to get pictures of NRHP sites for Commons. If there are sites you'd like photographed, please let me know at my talk page and I'll keep them in mind for my next trip to Sheridan County. I don't get up there as often as I'd like, but hope to be up that way sometime this spring. Ammodramus (talk) 17:09, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I apologize for taking so long to reply. If you are ever in the Ellsworth area make sure to let me know and it can be easily arranged to photograph the historic sites in the surrounding counties. - Westhistmatt —Preceding unsigned comment added by Westhistmatt (talk • contribs) 12:03, 8 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I went through southern Sheridan County a few weeks ago, and got photos of the Antioch potash plants and Lakeside, among other things. I wanted a photo of the District #119 North School in Ellsworth, which is a fairly recent addition to the National Register of Historic Places; but I didn't know what it looked like, and nothing had a "District 119" sign on it. I'm pretty sure I drove right past it but didn't recognize it.

Is the Loosveldt Bridge on private property? I got the impression somewhere that it was. If so, and if you can get me permission to photograph it, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Do you know if the Colclesser Bridge is still there? I looked at Google satellite photos, and didn't see a bridge at what I think is the right location.

I'll be in touch before I return to Sheridan County; unfortunately, that probably won't be before July at the very earliest.

--Ammodramus (talk) 14:26, 8 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am attempting to contact Ammodramus. How may I do so? Equinedistraction Equinedistraction (talk) 05:40, 23 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am very new at Wiki. I would like to email or contact Ammodramus. How may I do so? I have information pertinent to his/her photographs and areas of interest.

Greetings, o Equinedistraction--

Got your two messages at my talk page. That's an excellent way to contact me; just leave further messages in the section that you began at the end of the page.

Since you're new at WP, I'll offer you some suggestions re. talk pages. First, if you prefix a paragraph with a colon (:), it'll indent that paragraph slightly. More colons indent it more. That makes it easier to see who's saying what in a lengthy discussion. Second, at the end of your comment on a talk page, type four tildes (~~~~). That will automatically fill in your username and some date-and-time information.

Look forward to hearing from you--

--Ammodramus (talk) 15:33, 23 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ammodramus, thank you for the guidance. Your grammar peeves left me rolling on the floor. My list is almost identical, with the addition of the following: "When a person approaches you, THEY should always greet you with kindness." They. Everything is they. Who is they, anyway? Anyhoo, that drives me nuts, which is a pretty short drive.

I and my merry band of artisans are moving to parts north of Kearney. We are somewhat trepidatious about a dearth of wit and wisdom out on the prairie. Because we are language and photography-o-philes, and because I have been heavily involved with historic preservation and restorations of NHR and NHR candidate properties, we would love to get to know you and learn about your projects, past and present. I have not gone through the talk page guidelines yet, so I hope I am not offending any rule. I will study and become aware of the guidelines.

Best,

Eileen AKA Equinedistraction and merry band Equinedistraction (talk) 19:07, 23 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Goodness. Doubt very much that I can provide a great deal of wit and wisdom; my WP style is more about chasing down sources and inserting fussy footnotes. Also not sure about the "merry band" business: will my making personal contact lead to a score of Ken Kesey-channelers showing up at my doorstep and demanding that I host a revel?

Will chance it, though. To avoid putting personal information out in public, could you e-mail me? If you'll go to my user page or talk page, you'll find "Toolbox" in the left margin. Click on that to expand it, and you'll find "E-mail this user" about halfway down the list. I've got e-mail enabled, so you should be able to use that to send me contact information.

Since you're new to WP, I hope you won't mind my calling your attention to WP:OUTING. While it probably wouldn't take a great deal of work to discover my meatspace identity, I prefer to maintain at least a soupçon of anonymity. Please don't mention my real-world name, e-mail address, or personal details on talk pages or in other situations that might tend to identify--

Ammodramus (talk) 20:17, 23 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I just wanted to give you a great big thanks for helping on the Milly Bernard article, I am one of her great grand children (by marriage) and I have been meaning to add all that information but just could never find the time. It was difficult sometimes due to her marriages/divorces and the change in her last name to find information. You have done a great job and I appreciate it tremendously. She was a pioneer in women being elected to the Utah legislature and her achievements should be noted.

jlechem@gmail.com 16:29, 2 August 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jlechem (talk • contribs)

(to User:Freechild)

Noted with interest your addition of Template:Native Americans in Nebraska to several articles I've worked on. It's a nice template, and I think it'll be useful for navigating among such sites.

A couple of suggestions, however; and I'll make them to you rather than changing the template, since it appears that you've done most of the work on it, and may very well have considered these already. First, should it include Kitzawitzuk, which is in Kansas and not in Nebraska? Second, would it be useful to add Pike-Pawnee Village Site, which is in Webster County (and was the site of an event whose location was the subject of some dispute between the historical societies of KS and NE in the 1920s)?

I'm not doing any research in that direction right now, but it's possible that in the future I'll be writing more articles on Native American archaeological sites in Nebraska. If so, should they be added to the template?

--Ammodramus (talk) 16:15, 14 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nuts. I was up in Wallace just this summer; but I didn't have time to make it up to the Pulaski tunnel with my camera. Next time... --Ammodramus (talk) 23:20, 11 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, and I just looked at the article more carefully. In the major reference cited, should it be "Escapte" or is that your typo? (Since the source isn't online, I can't check it and correct it or [Sic] it myself.) --Ammodramus (talk) 23:24, 11 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's my typo. If you go back to Wallace, take a picture of the fire memorial. It's also part of the TR and on the NRHP Einbierbitte (talk) 17:33, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, the Carnegie Library and the Main Post Office in Wallace don't have pictures :) Einbierbitte (talk) 17:42, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Unlikely that I'll be back in Wallace in the near (or even not-so-near) future. This summer, I had to drive to Spokane, and Wallace was the spot I randomly chose for a birding break. --Ammodramus (talk) 17:45, 15 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(to User:Freechild)

Pleased to report that I got to Linoma Lighthouse yesterday with my camera; with luck, will have photos uploaded in a day or two.

I'm thinking of doing an expansion of the article. The National Register nom form for Linoma Beach is now available online via the Nebraska State Historical Society, and it's got a lot of information that probably wasn't available when the article was originally written.

In the course of expanding the article, I'd like to move it from "Linoma Lighthouse" to "Linoma Beach", with a redirect from "Linoma Lighthouse". The NRHP lists the entire property, not just the lighthouse; and even the article as it now stands discusses the whole resort and not just the one structure. As the original author and the principal contributor to date, would you object to my doing that?

--Ammodramus (talk) 20:02, 1 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for asking Ammodramus, I appreciate that. Please, have at it and let me know if I can be of use. I originally created the article because I wanted to learn about an artifact on the Platte I drove by all the time when I was in college. Sounds like it's better situated at Linoma Beach. Have fun! • Freechildtalk 21:39, 1 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You may be interested in the Grand Lake St. Marys Lighthouse, an inland lighthouse in Ohio. Nyttend (talk) 15:33, 7 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We've actually got another in Nebraska: Lake Minatare Lighthouse in Scotts Bluff County. Unfortunately, it was cloudy and gloomy the day I was there, so no photos. Ammodramus (talk) 15:56, 7 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

... and I hope you didn't find your first encounter with the GA process to be too stressful. Malleus Fatuorum 21:11, 3 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Again, many thanks for doing the GA review. I'm still following up one of your points (the one about the post-Barsetshire works), and will try to clarify that a bit. I assumed too much familiarity with Trollope on the part of the general reader. Ammodramus (talk) 00:13, 4 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I saw your recent pix in Lincoln County. Nice work!

I hope you've noticed Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest and will contribute there, either in some of the organization that still needs to be done, including simple comments for improvement, or by submitting pix. I'm sure you'll do especially well at Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest Best Photo. Are you going back to SC before December? If so there is a special challenge just for you.

All the best.

Smallbones (talk) 23:15, 15 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Might try for the greatest-distance-between-photos thing. I won't be going back to SC, but will be spending T'giving in eastern Penna., and am also contemplating a run out to the Nebraska Panhandle. With any luck, that'll give me photos across three time zones... Ammodramus (talk) 23:32, 15 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You know of course I'm in eastern Penna. So I'll try to get all the sites there before Thanksgiving :-) Just slightly more seriously (I know T'giving is not a good time for it), drop me an e-mail if I can buy you a beer while you're here. Smallbones (talk) 23:55, 15 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We'll get that beer drunk sooner or later, whether in Nebraska or Pennsylvania or somewhere more exotic. I'll be staying in Pike County, near Dingman's Ferry; will have my car, so I should be able to travel to wherever you want to meet. No idea about schedule yet—it'll depend on the plans made by various relatives, but I should be around long enough to have a certain amount of free time. Will e-mail you when I get there. Ammodramus (talk) 01:54, 16 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like you're going to have a far longer trip that I've had lately; since the spring, the farthest I've gotten from southwestern Indiana is the Pittsburgh metro area. Enjoy! Nyttend (talk) 02:00, 13 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Whoops! I have to fly out to Denver for the holiday. Maybe we can get that beer in DC next August? Smallbones (talk) 03:46, 13 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In response to something I said to Smallbones, he suggested asking you to get a photo of the Minisink Archeological Site, an NHL in Pike County; it's the state's only unillustrated NHL outside of the southeastern corner. The rest of this comment is essentially the same as what I copied to his talk page. The coords that I got for the Pike County list have part of the site in the woods just off U.S. Route 209; I dropped the Street View icon onto a random spot near the coords and found a pulloff spot. You might not get a wonderful picture, but it wouldn't be worse than the one I took at Swan's Landing. As well, the NHL nomination form speaks of farmers ploughing artifacts out of fields; very close to the pulloff spot is an area of open countryside overlooking the river. Nyttend (talk) 22:17, 13 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like I did volunteer you for something. As I read the map, it's 8 miles north of Dingman's Ferry, or 2 miles south of Milford on the main drag. The main drag being as lonely a piece of road as there is on the East Coast. When I drove through with my wife, I thought I'd need waders and a portable shower to get the photo, by Nyttend doesn't think so. Sorry! Smallbones (talk) 22:28, 13 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm a birder, so wet socks and mild hypothermia are business-as-usual for me. The place isn't far from where I'll be staying, so I'll do what I can to get it. Unless there's a historical marker, I doubt that I'll get a very impressive photo. The article speaks of "remains of fish and fruit"; maybe I can find a banana peel or a Long John Silver's box in the ditch by the road to illustrate it... Ammodramus (talk) 01:01, 14 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Street View suggests to me that the a photo will likely be somewhat similar to your shots of Dobytown without the marker; I suspect that you'll get a far better shot than many of my pictures, such as the above-linked Swan's Landing Site, the Newlove Works, or the Old Chillicothe Site. If you really feel like walking around in the woods rather than getting a photo of fields from the highway, a leading part of the site appears to be at 41°17′12″N 74°49′55″W / 41.28667°N 74.83194°W / 41.28667; -74.83194. Nyttend (talk) 03:49, 14 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A preliminary Google hunt indicates that the district includes Minisink Island. If I can establish that it includes the whole island, or the whole up- or downstream end, then I can try for a shot of the island with the river dividing around it. That'd be at least a little more interesting than the Dobytown photos, especially if I can get a shot from a high bank looking obliquely downward.

The NPS's Delaware Water Gap website discusses the district, and says that visitors "can hike the Minisink Historic District while on the Joseph M. McDade Recreational Trail". Unfortunately, the trail map at their link doesn't say anything in particular about the MHD. I'll see what I can learn at the visitor center once I get there. (The website also suggests canoeing or kayaking to the island, but that sounds like a good way to wind up in [[Category:Drowned Wikipedians]].) Ammodramus (talk) 15:21, 14 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your image of the Old Kaskaskia Village! As the Illinois River is very close but outside the image, can you revise your caption to indicate an estimated distance from the river, in order to orient people who see the image. (I know the river is very close). Thanks again, Bigturtle (talk) 19:43, 19 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have revised the caption, and also the description at Commons. It's possible (though far from certain) that I'll pass through the area again in a few weeks; if you're particularly interested in the site or the article, is there anything that you think especially ought to be photographed? I know very little about the site: mostly, I was trying to hit some of the unillustrated National Historic Landmarks in Illinois while travelling cross-country. I'd happily try to act on suggestions for better photos, if you'd care to make some and if my path takes me that way again. Ammodramus (talk) 22:41, 19 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your interest in the site. Unfortunately as you have noticed the State does not mark the site, presumably because they lack the means to guard and interpret it, and nobody wants free-lancers digging for artifacts. So your relatively anonymous-looking scene is perfect. Would it be possible for you to find and image the Farm Creek Section in nearby East Peoria, Illinois? Bigturtle (talk) 22:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ouch. Before I went to Old Kaskaskia Village, I spent the morning tramping along Farm Creek through Farmdale Recreation Area, looking for F.C. Section. Found what I thought was it and shot a bunch of photos. That night, miles and miles down the road, I studied the photos and description in the nom form, and realized that the place I'd shot definitely wasn't it. Re-checked the Google map; I suspect that if I'd gone another quarter-mile upstream, I'd have found the right place. I will definitely try for it on my way back west, weather permitting. "Weather permitting" is a big if: the recreation area is closed during rains and for 24 hours after. Ammodramus (talk) 01:06, 22 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I should have guessed that you had your eye on that site! Bigturtle (talk) 15:36, 22 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Caught the Farm Creek Section with the last of the daylight, obtaining some sub-excellent photos which are at Commons:Category:Farm Creek Section (Tazewell County, Illinois). Since I don't know geology or Illinois especially well, I've done a fairly minimal categorization. If you're so inclined, you might want to improve the descriptions and/or categorization. Ammodramus (talk) 23:56, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, I'll take a look at it. Bigturtle (talk) 00:10, 12 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the Libbey House photos! I've accumulated a big backlog of photos, due to spending a disproportionately large amount of free time on photo trips (i.e. not enough time for uploading), and one of the locations is Ohio's last unillustrated NHL. Nyttend (talk) 04:53, 21 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We lucked out. After I'd shot the Marie Webster House in Marion, IN, I had to decide whether to go northeast to Toledo or southeast to Kettering. The coin came up heads, so to Toledo I went. If you've got Kettering, I won't try to hit it on my way back westward. Ammodramus (talk) 11:00, 21 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How nice :-) I'd not checked the Indiana list, so I wasn't aware that you'd finished it. As soon as I finish typing this message, I'll complete my packing to leave Pennsylvania for the west; if I have time, I may try to go back to Kettering, because the current photo is absolutely horrible. The house is only slightly visible from the road when the leaves are on the trees, and I was there in early September; what's more, it's on the western side, and I was there in the late afternoon of a sunny day. Hope you enjoy the rest of your time in Pennsylvania! Nyttend (talk) 12:59, 21 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't get time to go to Kettering, but I finished up two other Ohio county lists, including one site that's of national significance. I'll upload the old photo and let you decide if it's horrible enough that you want to replace it soon. It will definitely need to be replaced eventually. Nyttend (talk) 03:20, 22 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I recognize the Kettering photo; I've taken it in a few places myself. If my route back to Nebraska takes me through southern Ohio, I'll see if I can get something better. Ammodramus (talk) 16:14, 22 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Drove I-70 across Ohio today. It rained all the way, and was coming down fairly hard when I passed Dayton, so I didn't try for the Kettering house. Next time... Ammodramus (talk) 01:14, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, no problem. I spent much of my day getting sites of more local interest, and although I've been inside for several hours straight, the hood of my sweatshirt is still drenched. If you go to the "Not visited" section of User:Nyttend/Ohio NRHP/Montgomery, you'll see that I have about seventy different reasons to go back to the area, and since I typically have an easier time getting to Ohio than you do, I expect that I'll be able to get over there at some point. Finally, I hope your visit to Ohio didn't leave you with too sour of a taste — remember that days like this also occur in the Buckeye State :-) Nyttend (talk) 02:32, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm OK with Ohio: had an enjoyable hike in Cuyahoga Valley NP on the way out, and would've liked to spend more time in Toledo, which I suspect has lots of great buildings to photograph. Had high hopes for Kettering, since it was overcast but not raining in Wheeling, and from your description of the site, an overcast winter day would be the best time to shoot it. But it wasn't to be...

As far as weather events go, I had to delete a bunch of photos from Monroe County, NY, because the falling snow left conspicuous streaks across them. Ammodramus (talk) 02:57, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Winter would definitely be the best time of year for the Kettering House, but even better than an overcast day might be a sunny morning. However, I can't imagine why I'd be in the area in the morning, so I'll likely have to settle for the overcast day...There's definitely room to go in the Toledo area. I've never visited that part of the state very much, and except for a single trip (which got all of the northwestern counties fully illustrated, except for one pesky site), which yielded only the Fallen Timbers battlefield image, I've not been to Lucas County since I started doing NR photographs. Thanks for the Ohio County work; the Panhandle is the only part of the state I've been to in recent years (thanks to trips to my metro-Pittsburgh alma mater), and I've concentrated most of my photo time from my trips either on eastern Ohio or on Brooke County, next north of Ohio County — essentially all that I have for Ohio County is the NHLs, and other people already got better images of them anyway. Nyttend (talk) 05:39, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I saw that there were no entries for the West Virginia contest, so concluded that the state must be under-photographed and hit a couple of quick sites in Wheeling on my way westward from Pittsburgh. I'd have done more there, but hoped to make it to Kettering while there was still lots of daylight; had I known that the weather in Ohio state would be so inclement, I'd have spent some time on Ohio County. I suspect, although I haven't actually looked at the county lists, that the counties that really need to be worked are the ones that don't lie along Interstates. Ammodramus (talk) 13:19, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure your final comment is right. Ohio isn't that way, since the two most active photographers (Roseohioresident and I) have both been active with travelling to more isolated counties, but I'm sure it's that way in many other states. Once we start talking about counties west of Illinois' eastern edge, I've not gotten any photos in counties without interstates, except for one in Ford County, Kansas: the Dodge City Downtown HD. West Virginia hasn't gotten a ton of attention; Bitmapped, formerly Bmpowell, has done his best, but he hasn't travelled a ton or gotten as dense a concentration as you, Smallbones, or I have tried to do. Nyttend (talk) 13:32, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In Pike County. Got what I think are some acceptable pictures for Minisink Archeological Site; it turns out that the Manna site, referred to in the article, is easily located, and that the bank erosion can be photographed reasonably well from across Raymondskill Creek. Will upload shortly.

While I was in that area, ran up to Milford and got some photos in the Jervis Gordon Grist Mill Historic District. I'm sure that one of the buildings I photographed is in the district (the mill building itself). However, the nom form for Milford Historic District Boundary Increase tells me that there are three contributing buildings and a contributing structure in the JGGMHD. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell me what they are; and I can't find a nom form for the JGGMHD itself. Since you've presumably got some experience tracking down this sort of thing in Penna., do you know of a place where I might be able to find the nom form or something else that'd tell me what buildings are and aren't in the HD? Thanks. Ammodramus (talk) 01:31, 27 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

try: https://www.dot7.state.pa.us/ce_imagery/phmc_scans/H077381_01H.pdf

and https://www.dot7.state.pa.us/ce_imagery/phmc_scans/H077381_01B.jpg

This works the majority of the time.

Smallbones

Your question

I've just done some editing of your article Jeevana Mukthi: mostly adding Wikilinks and touching up the English idiom. However, there were two things that I was unable to do.

In the article, the king's mother is going to perform a cheppula nomu. I'm afraid that I don't know what this is, and a Google search for the phrase gained me nothing. We ought to have a Wikilink or a brief parenthetical note telling readers what this is.

Does the title have an English translation? The "Jeevana" is similar enough to the name "Jeevudu" that I suspect it's a form of it. If the title can be translated into English, that translation should be included.

My answer

Jeevan/Jeevan or Jeevudu or Jeevi are all related to the Life in biological term. Jeevi or Jeevudu means all living beings. Jeevan or Jeevana means the life itself.

Mukti or Moksha is a sanskrit word explained in its wikipage.

Combining the two words it means Mukti for Jeevi, that is according to Ancient Hindu scripts many Mukti while living is the ultimate goal for the priests and yogis. As a cobbler Jeevudu got this by wholehearted faithfulness towards Vishnu in this film.

Am I clear and got some clarity about the film title and names.Dr. Rajasekhar A. 06:25, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the correction. I may be peculiar, but have not (to my knowledge) been characterized as "odd". Just an attempt at humor there. The proper name of this historic organization was unknown to me, and its good to get it right. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 16:32, 30 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'd probably count as "odd", but only because I haven't yet got even... Easy to get the adjective wrong; I only know it from the number of times I've tried to Wikilink the name, and come up with a redlink for "International...". Happily, no one's created a redirect from the wrong I-word. Ammodramus (talk) 23:56, 30 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the Minisink pix - I really like the one from the bluff (from NJ?)

I got the last 2 NHLs in PA today (nice weather, bad traffic)

and, we're tied at 8 in the NHL contest, but I think I'm all out of potential sites. Smallbones (talk) 03:20, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like it's going to be a tie, unless somebody's sitting on a bunch of NHL photos elsewhere. I'll be in western New York and Pittsburgh through the weekend, and there'll be no NHLs within easy reach. I'm hoping to hit at least one on the way back to Nebraska, but by then the contest will be over.

The shots of Minisink Island from above were taken from a trail on the Penna. side. Took them somewhat early in the morning, and had to wait an hour or so for the fog over the river to burn off so that the island would be visible. According to Google Earth, the island itself is in NJ; as I recall, I used photos of it to illustrate the NJ lists, and photos of the Manna site (OK, but late-morning light would've been better) for the Penna. lists. --Ammodramus (talk) 11:52, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Per your question to Smallbones — go to the CRGIS and follow the directions. If you have Adobe's SVG viewer (admittedly, out of date, but you can still download it from the Adobe website), you can find non-archaeologicla sites on a map (note that the vast majority of features on the map aren't NR-listed), or you can do a text-based search that doesn't require the SVG viewer. Nyttend (talk) 17:56, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the comment on my courthouse image in the best-photo contest. I didn't crop it — as far as I know, Windows Paint is the only software on this computer that's capable of editing images at all. By the way, where were the broken bridges on which you're complimented farther down this page? Nyttend (talk) 06:23, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I use Microsoft Office Picture Manager to rotate and crop my photos before I upload them, but that's all the image manipulation I can do. However, it's useful, because for some reason I list slightly to port when I take pictures, even when I'm trying to compensate for that tendency to tilt. Also, since I can crop, I can take main-street shots from a considerable distance to reduce the perspective difference between the near and the far buildings, then cut out the big patch of sky that I get by doing that.

As far as I know, my downed-bridge photos aren't on any WP pages. User:Visitor7 must've gone through Commons:Category:Pictures by Ammodramus (a category that I created at your suggestion, by the way, for which thanks) to find them. If you want to see them yourself, your best bet is to go through the subcategories of Commons:Category:June 2010 Nebraska floods. Ammodramus (talk) 14:13, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, okay: I figured that these were some NR-listed bridges that you'd visited over Thanksgiving, but I was confused because I couldn't find them in your recent edits to NR lists. I have to say that I'm amused by one image: in File:Cowboy Trail Norfolk Elkhorn River xing damaged 1.JPG, the "Cowboy Trail CLOSED Until Further Notice" sign seems to be slightly unneeded :-) I didn't know that Picture Manager was able to rotate or crop things; I'll see what I can do with it. Thanks! Nyttend (talk) 14:25, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Not a big deal at all. I'm not particularly interested in the NSHS right now. Because of Hill's intricate connection to the org I thought See also-ing NSHS would be a good connect for readers, but I don't really care. Thanks for the heads-up though- I appreciate the courtesy. • Freechildtalk 23:53, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

		The Photographer's Barnstar
		Awarded for tying the Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest for traveling the farthest within one state. I know that you traveled an incredible distance to the corner of the state just to get one of the photos. Royalbroil 01:20, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Too bad that google maps was too inaccurate to give a definitive winner. Both of you had traveled about the same distance so you earned your award! Royalbroil 01:20, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sharing an award with a great photographer is an honor. Your photos of the broken bridges are especially tranquil, with nary a sign of the storm but that the bridges are ruined. I also loved the Midwestern Theater. I am going to use your categorizing as an inspiration to do a better job categorizing my own pictures (someone has recently been scolding me about it on Wikimedia Commons). See you at the next contest. Visitor7 (talk) 04:26, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

	The Photographer's Barnstar
	Awarded for tying with User:Smallbones in the Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest for adding the most photographs to National Historic Landmarks. Congrats! ‖ Ebyabe talk - Border Town ‖ 15:33, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am pretty much lost after I wrote the article as to formatting sources, references, footnotes etc. Glad that you and 7&6=13 are taking care of this. Broken Bow, Nebraska (not Broken Arrow) is correct. I found the error over the summer when I make a display for the museum in Marble showing where the marble is used but I did not update my list. The building was an IOOF building and I had a telephone talk with one of the two surviving members. The building today is a movie theater own by the president of a bank in Broken Bow and he said the marble is on the interior. I know my telephone conversations are not Wiki verify. Can something be added to correct the location? OneHistoryGuy (talk) 06:51, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ammodramus, Use this <ref group=upper-alpha> at the beginning of each citation. That should work. Hope that helps. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 01:42, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The photos are in the categories "Curtiss Robin" and "Museum of Flight, Seattle." The storyboards are included as background info if it would be useful. We happened to be outside looking at the prototype Boeing 747 (built in 1969) when one of the brand new 747-8 jets took off from Boeing Field. Those pics will go up in a day or so. Visitor7 (talk) 07:35, 14 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the excellent photos. I've placed one of them in the McCook Daily Gazette article.

The storyboards are interesting—I hadn't known about the car-giveaway promotion—but I'd be cautious about uploading photos of things like that, because I'm not sure if the text or images on them is covered by copyright.

I greatly appreciate your getting the photos. One thing that I haven't found on WP is a way to contact local photographers with requests for specific pictures. I've put a note up at WP:WikiProject Nebraska indicating that I'd be willing to try and photograph specific sites in the state; but it'd be a good thing if WP had a more organized way for editors seeking photos to get in touch with photographers who might be willing and able to take them. Ammodramus (talk) 14:28, 14 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Would you happen to, by any small chance, be planning a trip to Wyoming any time soon? I've been trying to develop some of the Natrona County NRHP articles, most of which remain photo-less. Also, thank you for doing so much photography of landmarks in rural Nebraska. It was quite a nice surprise to learn that the NRHP structures in my community have nice photos on Wikimedia of them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chevsapher (talk • contribs) 04:42, 17 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Don't worry, I only have a very crude idea of what a neo-Renaissance corbelled balustrade would look like too. My high school has no Architecture classes; it's just a little thing I do some reading on since I've always been fascinated with historic structures. Anyway, the majority of these places need photographed. I might be able to get some relatives to get a few photos there this week, but that's it. I'm smacking myself for not getting photos of all these places when I lived in Casper, but it's too late now. Chevsapher (talk) 16:09, 18 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

All right them; thanks! And no, from my experience historical societies don't know much about architecture (especially mine!). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chevsapher (talk • contribs) 00:11, 19 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

	The Barnstar of Diligence
	Thanks for helping me with all of the Nebraska City pages, You have been diligent in all of your work especially with that of my area. For that and your work on the National Register of Historic Places listings in Nebraska, &c. I award you this Barnstar of Diligence. WhitmanNE (talk) 05:47, 27 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's been a while since I've bugged you with a newbie problem, so I hope that you'll let me abuse your kindness again—

I've just started going through the AfD process with ESS Drum & Bugle Corps, which I strongly suspect of being a high-school prank or the like. Everything went swimmingly until I reached the step where I edited Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2012 January 4. The subclusion process seems to have done everything it should, and my suggestion appears to be in the same format as everyone else's in the edit window; but the article's title, history-link, etc., don't show up.

I experimented by moving my proposal below the top one in the list, but that didn't help at all. The only thing I can think of is that the ampersand in the title interacts strangely with the template. However, I see that an ampersand isn't on the list of forbidden characters in article titles.

Any thoughts? Guidance would be appreciated; if nothing else, could you suggest an appropriate venue at which to ask this question? Thanks (and thanks again for all the questions you've answered in the past). --Ammodramus (talk) 16:49, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure what happened here. Did you use the template that appears at the bottom of the AFD tag? When you subst the afd1 template onto an article, it gives you some instructions, including a preloaded template for creating the deletion discussion page; you can see these lines at the bottom of {{Article for deletion/dated}}. I'm not quite sure how to fix an already-created nomination, so I simply deleted your original nomination, created a new one with your text, and restored your original nomination. Everything looks good now. Nyttend (talk) 17:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks. I think you've hit on what I did wrong. Instead of clicking on the "Preloaded debate", I clicked the redlink for "this article's entry". Will try to remember that next time; maybe I should try to find some deletion-worthy articles for practice... Ammodramus (talk) 17:28, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Why don't you nominate Strayboots or EDEX Careers? Nyttend (talk) 18:11, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm... Strayboots looks like it might have verifiable notability from the Times story (which badly wants formatting). EDEX Careers looks like it got its may-not-meet-notability-guidelines template this month; would it be appropriate to propose it for deletion before giving the editor a chance to respond? I'm thinking about StealTheDeal, which looks promotional and which only cites a couple of press releases from the company itself. A Google search doesn't turn up any evidence that they've been covered by reputable media. Beside, they use "everyday" as an adverb; thus their deletion will make the world a slightly better place. Ammodramus (talk) 00:49, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Tried it with StealTheDeal. It worked much better when I actually followed the directions... To boot, when I notified the editor who'd created the article that it'd was up at AfD, I found that it'd been deleted before and that the editor had apparently re-created it. Ammodramus (talk) 01:17, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like you did everything right; glad to be of aid. Sorry that I've taken a long time to respond; I spent much of today finishing the uploads for a photo trip from a week ago that yielded more than 125 hitherto-unphotographed sites. Nyttend (talk) 02:33, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nice article. I've made some minor tweaks to it, and uprated it from stub to start: it's near the border, but I think it's more toward the start side, since you've got multiple references and have clearly put some effort into it—in sharp contrast with all too many NRHP stubs, which are more like this.

In the article, you mention a ghost sign for a hardware store. Is that currently visible, and, if so, does it want to be photographed? I don't expect to get to Crawford in the next month or two, but if you think a photo would help, I'll put it on my to-do list.

Hope that we can expect more Dawes County articles soon — Ammodramus (talk) 01:22, 6 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the nice comment on my talk page! The ghost sign is indeed visible; it was painted over years ago and is now showing up again. Although I must thank you for volunteering to take a photo, I feel that would be pure laziness on my part, as I live a whopping four blocks from the structure. :*

And yes, I'm already working on another article. I'm very surprised that more Dawes County building are NRHP-listed; I can think of more than a few that should be shoe-ins. Chevsapher (talk) 16:50, 6 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If you can get a good photo of the ghost sign, it might not be a bad idea to include it as a citation. You can link to a Commons file without making it show up as a picture by putting a colon in front of the word "File", so you can produce a footnote that looks like: "See photo". As I understand, taking a photo doesn't count as original research, so you won't be scolded for WP:NOR.

Have you seen the Nebraska Historic Buildings Survey for Dawes County? You might find it useful if you're looking for information on county history, and specifically on historic buildings that aren't on the NRHP. The Nebraska State Historical Society has one for most (though not all) counties in the state; I usually find them by Googling (countyname historic building survey nebraska), but you can probably find them through the NSHS website as well. There might be a hard copy of it in the Crawford library, but it's nice to have an online version that you can link to in footnotes.

Look forward to the forthcoming articles—and maybe they'll pressure me into working on some of the ones that have been sitting on my to-do list for a long time. Ammodramus (talk) 18:12, 6 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've used that document several times! I'm glad they put it together; it's very useful. The NSHS also has put all the NRHP Nebraska nomination forms on their website, most of which aren't on FOCUS. If I remember correctly, there are also some Nebraska History articles on their website that could come in handy as sources.

I can't remember if the Crawford Library has the aforementioned document on file; they have a rather paltry local history section. However, I have access to the Crawford Historical Museum's collection of books, photos, and documents, which is a huge source for local information. Again, thanks for all the helpful suggestions! Chevsapher (talk) 19:00, 6 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:Location) Thanks for the compliment re. Chris Cole (politician). Would you say that the article's moved beyond stubhood and merits a "Start" rating? I'm not sure just where the boundary is, and in any case I'm not sure if it's quite proper to rate one's own work. Ammodramus (talk) 22:35, 12 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The January 2012 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

 
--Kumi-Taskbot (talk) 18:41, 16 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Ammodramus. I'm stopping by to let you know that this line is in the source. It's on Page 2. It's easy to overlook that an article has more than one page, so I can understand how you missed it. I never miss them anymore because I'm very aware that they might exist, but I know that others may not be as aware. Anyway, just wanted to let you know that I restored the line, and toned down the duplicate referencing. Feel free to tweak this line or anything else in the article of course. It could probably use a good copyedit, especially since it was written at a time when my Wikipedia-article-writing skills weren't as improved as they are now. That goes for grammar aspects too. Flyer22 (talk) 15:01, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the comment. I replied there on my talk page (as the note at the top says I will, LOL). Flyer22 (talk) 15:22, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Just found and read with great interest this article. I'll have to look for it the next time I get out to the northern Panhandle.

A couple of things that I didn't find in the article, and that should perhaps be in it. First, what kind of material does the tunnel run through? Is it cut through rock, or is it primarily dug through earth? Since it's described as a major engineering feat for its time, I assume that there's something peculiar about the local geology to make the construction difficult. Second, why was the Nat'l Guard there to prevent sabotage? Was there some kind of controversy involving the railroad or the tunnel? Think readers would like to know more about both of these—I certainly would. Ammodramus (talk) 05:17, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to know more about these issues too, unfortunately. My sources were rather vague, but they were the only ones I could find. First, I'm not sure whether the tunnel is cut through rock or dirt; in fact, different sources say differently. Second, I have no idea. Third, I have no idea either, although I've been wondering how reliable the source I stated on this statement is, judging from what I know about the gal who wrote it.

I would love to add more info to the article, but until I find more sources, it just isn't happening. Even the article as it is cites a rural kid's 4H paper! Chevsapher (talk) 15:17, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Too bad you can't find out more; it sounds like a great subject. Would it help to ask at Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains? A railroad enthusiast might have sources on the CB&Q that might shed some light on these, especially if the concern about sabotage was due to some kind of labor unrest that affected the whole company. Also, should I put this on my list of things to photograph the next time I'm in Dawes Co.? Ammodramus (talk) 16:57, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the ideas! There has to be more information out there.

And sure! I live so close to the tunnel that it isn't funny, but I don't have a driver's license. Hopefully I can get out there this summer, but who knows. If I can get a picture, then I'll tell you. Again, thanks for the help. Chevsapher (talk) 00:19, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No trouble for me to try to get pictures: I'll certainly be in Dawes County in the next few months, and I want to check the tunnel out anyhow—until I saw the article, I had no inkling that it existed. Good luck with the further research— Ammodramus (talk) 00:30, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's on a dirt road, so don't go after it's rained. Also, ticks love the tunnel, so be careful. It really is worth seeing, though. Chevsapher (talk) 00:45, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Just passing through re:ruts, but I got some very small refs searching Google books - a source many folks ignore. I put the refs on the talk page. BTW, please get pix of the graffiti I just found out that Commons has a special dispensation for graffiti (even though it is theoretically copyrighted). Wikipedia needs more graffiti! (As always) Smallbones (talk) 01:23, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:Smallbones). Back in October, you complimented me on some pictures of ruts at O'Fallon's Bluff in Lincoln County, Nebraska. I recently hit California Hill in Keith County, and couldn't have asked for better rut-photography conditions: unmelted snow in the ruts, bare ground around them. The photos are at Commons:Category:California Hill (Keith County, Nebraska), if you'd like to admire them. Hoping to hit two more rut sites (in Butler and Lancaster counties) this week; hope that I'll find conditions half as good there. Ammodramus (talk) 18:24, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Very, very nice ruts. I'm just mad that I pulled off the interstate there, looked at the sign and thought "I'll never make it to .... if I go looking for those ruts!" If I ever find a "Ruts Barnstar" you'll be the first to get it. Smallbones (talk) 01:23, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I see no reason not to add the J. Schmuck Block listing to the Gage County list. I went ahead and added it, but it's really pretty easy to add new entries. I just cut and paste the NRHP row template info from another listing and replace the data for each parameter with the info for the listing you're adding. Renumbering the rows of a large table is a bit of a hassle, but I've got a method that involves copying the raw table text out to a spreadsheet, manipulating the data there and then pasting it back into the edit window in Wikipedia. It only takes about 20 or 30 seconds no matter how large the table is. For future reference, if you work on a long table that you'd like me to renumber, just post a message on my talk page.

It seems to me that I've come across other sites that were listed around that same time that are missing from the tables. I think I'll go back and look at the announcements from that period to see if we're missing others. I hope this isn't a can of worms! --sanfranman59 (talk) 17:13, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sure enough, I found another listing that's missing from the Burt County list from that same NPS new listings announcement. Oddly, there were also 4 listings announced in Douglas County (Omaha) and 1 in Hall County at that time, but they're all included in the current tables. So it's not like we just failed to record the listings in that NPS announcement. --sanfranman59 (talk) 17:32, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:Chevsapher) Just saw File:Crawford, Nebraska 2nd St from Main.JPG pop up on my Commons watchlist, for your addition of image notes. Wow! I had no idea that such a trick was possible. I'm going to have to read up on it—it'd be a lot easier than descriptions like "The third building from the left, partly obscured by the billboard, is the..."

Also saw the new photos you added for the Crawford post office. I agree that the article is better for an illustration of the mural, since that was the reason for the building's addition to the NRHP. However, I think we'd have copyright problems with photos showing the entire mural at a fairly high resolution: see this USPS page. While the use of the photos in a WP article would probably be OK, photos on Commons are supposed to be free-use, without, for example, the USPS's restrictions on commercial use. For that reason, when I photograph interiors of post offices with New Deal murals, I try to make the mural a fairly small (and low-resolution) part of the total scene, and to make sure that a non-trivial portion of the mural is obscured by foreground objects. Ammodramus (talk) 22:07, 10 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Just saw File:Crawford, Nebraska 2nd St from Main.JPG pop up on my Commons watchlist, for your addition of image notes. Wow! I had no idea that such a trick was possible. I'm going to have to read up on it—it'd be a lot easier than descriptions like "The third building from the left, partly obscured by the billboard, is the..."

Also saw the new photos you added for the Crawford post office. I agree that the article is better for an illustration of the mural, since that was the reason for the building's addition to the NRHP. However, I think we'd have copyright problems with photos showing the entire mural at a fairly high resolution: see this USPS page. While the use of the photos in a WP article would probably be OK, photos on Commons are supposed to be free-use, without, for example, the USPS's restrictions on commercial use. For that reason, when I photograph interiors of post offices with New Deal murals, I try to make the mural a fairly small (and low-resolution) part of the total scene, and to make sure that a non-trivial portion of the mural is obscured by foreground objects. Ammodramus (talk) 22:07, 10 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't know that the trick was possible either until last Sunday. And, better yet, the notes don't need sourced!

Anyway, thanks for the notice about the photos. I never would have guessed, especially since the murals were commissioned by the Section of Fine Arts and not the USPS. I'll get around to making the image(s) smaller when I can; but please feel free to do that yourself if you want to. Chevsapher (talk) 01:11, 11 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"What a great new section..." You'll feel otherwise when you've got a few hundred towns on your watchlist. The notable-residents section is a major magnet for vandalism: "John Smith internatoinally known STUD!!", and that kind of thing. The only place it's worse is at articles about high schools... Ammodramus (talk) 21:33, 13 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That really must be a pain! But that's why I don't have a ton of pages on my watchlist. I think it's a nice addition to the Crawford article specifically because I didn't know that anyone from Crawford ever reached "notability" status.

I'm glad you care about Nebraska as much as you do, though. It's nice to know that someone else appreciates what's commonly known as a really boring stretch of land between Iowa and Wyoming. Chevsapher (talk) 02:39, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

After adding black borders manually to atleast 50 title pages, I found out that adding the |border parameter does just about the same thing, as in The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. Feel free to have a laugh at my expense... ;) INeverCry 18:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That's how it usually goes, learning after repeated mistakes... On an unrelated subject, I've nominated my article George Crabbe for GA. I hope it does as well as The Vicar. Someone I asked for advice raised an issue with the older public domain refs I used, but, as that's all I've got and can't afford the newest bio, I'll have to wait and see if they hold up. Wish me luck! INeverCry 22:59, 2 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the fixes. Crabbe's father's name was also George, so to avoid confusion I didn't use it. The poet's oldest son was a George as well. ;) Anyway, I hope I draw a good reviewer, as my other GA promotion (The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs) took the reviewer over a month with several reminders. We'll see... INeverCry 00:01, 3 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I had to pull in another source, but I was able to add all the needed family details, to the lead and the early life section. INeverCry 00:48, 3 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Have a look at Commons:National Archives and Records Administration/Categorize/US National Archives series: District of Nebraska: Omaha: Equity Cases, compiled 1913 - 1955 and Commons:National Archives and Records Administration/Categorize/US National Archives series: District of Nebraska: Grand Island: Civil Cases, compiled 1938 - 1974 if you haven't already.

Commons:National Archives and Records Administration/Categorize might have some other things you would be interested in.

Also, in the case of George Crabbe I found a chronological mistake from one of my old sources, and there's a new 2004 bio of Crabbe, so I've un-GANed it until I can get a hold of the newer source. INeverCry 00:03, 4 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:WilliamJE.) I notice that you've recently made a number of edits to articles about Nebraska municipalities, most of which appear to be insertions of notable residents.

Could I ask you to add edit summaries when you make such edits? I have a great many Nebraska articles on my watchlist, and when I find an edit without a summary, I have to check up on it and make sure it's not vandalism, spam, editorializing, etc. This is particularly true in the notable-residents section, which is a magnet for vandalism—"John Smith world famuos STUD!!!" and the like. If you'll add edit summaries, that'll save me and other page-watchers the necessity of following your edits to make sure they're legit. Thanks. Ammodramus (talk) 19:38, 1 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

First of all not 'most of which appear to be insertions of notable residents', but 'all of which appear to be insertions of notable residents'. You won't find one person I added to a Nebraska, or another state article, that isn't a notable person aka has their own independent wikipedia article.

In fact if you did even a cursory check of my 15,000+ edit history, you'll frequently see this edit summary 'Needs either a wikipedia article or some references to back up their notability'. I edit non notable people out of articles on a regular basis. Among my last 100 edits is this one[1] I did yesterday. 13 of my last 500 contain that edit summary. My last 500 edits go back to May 20th 2012.

Edit summaries take time, especially if I have to write a brand new explanation every time I add a person. I don't use automation for my edits. The persons I add mostly are athletes and politicians but I'll do anyone I stumble across while surfing WP and I like adding notable people sections to small town articles. Steve Glimp played 18 games for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1923 and he was born in Cornwell Nebraska population of 48. Glimp wasn't famous but he has an article and an article is all that is needed to establish notability. BTW the Glimp explanation is fictional.

I see a link to a article(not a redlink), I WP:AGF unless something is fishy and makes me check further. Like I did with Curt Kaufman a baseball player who was mentioned in not one but two Iowa town articles all based on WP:OR aka a personal interview[2] by a fly by editor[3] who hasn't contributed to WP in 6.5 years.

Try AGF when a experienced editor adds a notable person with a dedicated wikipedia article. We're not IP editors or fly bys....William 22:41, 1 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your reply. I'm glad that someone else is excising non-notable notables from articles. I personally think that the "Notable residents" section is a curse and an affliction, but that's one man's opinion: I recognize that it's entrenched in WP, and that I have to live with it as best I can.

I don't think that WP:AGF is a valid argument in this situation. AGF has to do with the motives of an editor, not with the appropriateness of an edit. I'm sure you've encountered situations aplenty in which a registered editor has made changes that've had to be reverted, not because of deliberate vandalism, but because they're pushing a POV, inserting irrelevancies—or adding the high-school quarterback to the notables section, on the strength of a write-up in the local paper.

You describe yourself as "an experienced editor". Unfortunately, there are too many Wikipedians out there for me to know who's experienced and who's not. Because of WP:FIES, most experienced editors add edit summaries; so the absence of one is a warning that an edit may have been made by an inexperienced editor, or at least one who doesn't have a terribly firm grasp of WP principles and etiquette. When I'm checking my watchlist, the lack of an edit summary is a red flag, indicating that this is an edit that needs to be checked up on.

"Edit summaries take time" strikes me as a rather bad argument. The time that you save yourself by omitting the summary is probably much less than the time that it costs your brother editors to check up on those suspicious no-summary edits. Considered in that light, the argument boils down to: "My time is more valuable than yours." This, I think is why we have WP:FIES; and why we have Template:Uw-editsummary for those who disregard it. Ammodramus (talk) 15:19, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I do not like your threatening attitude. Put up one instance of me putting one non notable into an article or get off my back...William 15:28, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Where, exactly, am I threatening you, and with what? The strongest "threat" I can see is the implication that I can put an embarrassing template on your talk page, a template that you can promptly remove. Moreover, I'm not actually threatening to put the template there; I'm pointing out its existence as supporting my contention that WP etiquette calls for you to leave an edit summary.

I haven't suggested that any of your edits have been inappropriate (and, as best I can remember, I haven't reverted any of them). My point is that however unexceptionable the edits may be, if they show up on my watchlist with no edit summary, then I have to check up on them and make sure they're OK. This wastes time that I could be spending on more productive uses (like the article I'm developing at a rate of about two paragraphs a day); and this waste of time could be avoided if you'd leave edit summaries. Your response to this seems to be "Yes, but leaving an edit summary wastes my time, and I'd rather waste your time than mine." To this I reply, "However, Wikiquette, as embodied in WP:FIES and supported by Template:Uw-editsummary, supports my position rather than yours."

I see no element of threat in any of this. I'm trying to point out, with supporting arguments, that you're committing a Wikisolecism by not leaving edit summaries, and to ask that you change this behavior out of consideration for your fellow editors. Ammodramus (talk) 16:27, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Warning[edit]

One more post to my talk page and I will report you to the proper wikipedia authorities for WP:Harassment. If you're so worried about wasting your time, you wouldn't be bothering me who has repeatedly asked you to prove one time I put something wrong into one of your watchlist articles. Instead I get threatened with to quote you a 'embarrassing template'. Why don't you look into the arbcom and try seeing if you can join it. They're on a witch hunt right now for Rich Farmbrough and you'd fit in perfectly. In the meantime Get off my back and page....William 16:51, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've just read through WP:HA, and am confident that I'm not committing it. Indeed, I'd ask that you read WP:HA#NOT, which states in part, "[I]t must be emphasized that one editor warning another for disruption or incivility is not harassment if the claims are presented civilly, made in good faith and in an attempt to resolve a dispute instead of escalating one." I think that describes the situation here. I'm asking you to abide by the WP guideline in WP:FIES, and explaining why your failure to do so causes inconvenience to your fellow editors; you're declining to do so, and responding with accusations of threats and harassment.

How would you suggest that I handle this matter in a non-harassing way, short of resigning myself to continuing to put up with your breaches of the edit-summary policy? I reiterate that this isn't just Wikifussiness on my part: these un-summaried edits cost me and other editors time and inconvenience. Ammodramus (talk) 20:05, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not in Good faith at all. Threats, Failure to WP:AGF, Failure to comply with multiple requests to both put up or not posting to my talk page, failure to read the notice at the top of my talk page that says to reply at your talk page. That's harassment because its certainly clear you know how to read. See you at the etiquette boards....William 20:22, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'd rather not pester the overworked dispute-resolution people with this, the more so since it seems like an issue that we could resolve so easily by discussion. Again, let me ask: if you were being subjected to inconvenience and loss of time because of what you had excellent reason to believe was another editor's failure to observe WP policy, what would you do? If that editor refused to acknowledge the validity of your complaint or to change his behavior, failed to make arguments supporting his own position, and then demanded that you cease all contact, how would you respond? Throughout this discussion, I've been trying to conduct myself as I'd want someone to act toward me if the roles were reversed. I'd willingly hear your argument that I'm misapplying WP:FIES, but as far as I can see you've made no such argument. Ammodramus (talk) 20:52, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Request renewed[edit]

Hoping that Saturday was an especially rough day for you, and that your life's now a considerably more pleasant place, I'll renew my recent request, in hopes of a more favorable reception.

Could you please add edit summaries when you add notable residents to articles on communities? As I said recently, the lack of a summary on an edit complicates my task of going through my watchlist and checking for inappropriate edits. Since most experienced editors use them, the absence of one is a red flag on my watchlist.

An additional use of edit summaries that didn't occur to me when I was writing you Saturday, but that's struck me since then, is that they make it easier to go through an article's history. If an editor's trying to find when and by whom a questionable edit was made, the edit summaries in the history page help greatly.

Please note that I'm in no way questioning the legitimacy of any of your edits. The problems created by the lack of an edit summary arise when I'm going through my watchlist and deciding which of the recent edits need to be followed up; or when I'm going through an article history trying to find a particular edit, and have to check edits individually because there's no summary to tell me whether it might be the one I'm looking for or not.

To your point that writing edit summaries takes time, I'll repeat: the time that it saves you now is offset by the time that it costs other editors later. This seems to come down to a question of whose time and convenience come first. To me, WP:FIES resolves that question; and the existence of a reminder template for editors who don't include summaries strongly suggests that Wikiquette calls for including them.

Thanks for your attention to this, and I hope that your pursuits, Wikipedic and otherwise, are going well. Ammodramus (talk) 17:29, 5 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Go here[4]          [it's now at [5]]

And once again don't ever reply to my talk page again till you can produce one edit where I put a non notable person into a town article....William 18:15, 5 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure if this helps, but every time I edit a section, say "Notable residents", the software automatically adds a an edit summary of the section name. I looked through "My preferences" (between "My sandbox" and "My watchlist" at the top of the page) to see if I set it up this way, but I'm not sure I found anything. It might be following the tabs "My preferences" "editing" then mark the 3rd box under Advanced options:

"Advanced options

Edit area font style:

• Show preview before edit box
• Show preview on first edit
• Enable section editing via [edit] links"

If that's not it I'm sure I can find out somewhere.

In summary Reset My preferences ==> automatic edit comment ==> no argument

All the best,

Smallbones (talk) 18:20, 5 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(To User:Frankie Rae.) There's a good chance that within the next two or three weeks, I'll be up in the vicinity of Lake Andes, South Dakota. If so, I'll try to hit the Chas. Mix County courthouse in the early morning or late evening, when there's some sunlight on the north side. If I should make it there, are there any photos that you'd particularly like me to try to get? (If I can, I'll go on a weekday and try for some interior shots as well.) Ammodramus (talk) 00:42, 6 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Perfect timing for north facade shots! You've taken superb photos, but consider these four ideas:

• The terra cotta panels to either side of the main entrance (you already have views of the windows with matching trim just below them)
• The stone coping and fancy brickwork immediately below roofline, either straight on or at a corner other than the southwest (you have a great photo of the chimney corner already)
• The interior lobby and dome are thought to be quite something. As you may know by now, Steele really liked domes.
• Two observers talk about an interior water fountain covered with a mosaic, perhaps in the same lobby.

If you get truly ambitious, Armour, South Dakota is nearby. If you end up there:

Armour Carnegie Library (part of the Armour Historic District)

Year: 1915 Address: 915 Main Street, Armour, South Dakota

As you know by now, this is one of Steele’s early Prairie School buildings. Here’s a photo: [[6]] The hip roof and overhanging eaves are classic Prairie Style. The brickwork is likely important, and might still show the original red mortar between tan bricks. It appears to have a water table just over the basement foundation level, which originally was of limestone ashlar and might still be. It should match the panel over the entrance with the name engraved. The main windows in front were once larger, and photos showing their partially filled reduced size could be important. Interior trim is quarter sawn oak, if you can get inside.

The library appears to be at one edge (Third and Main) of an extensive historic district (30 buildings or so) from the brief span of years when Armour was the second biggest town in South Dakota. You might photograph some of them for completeness, if you like, but it could be an overwhelming quantity of work. If you decide to pursue them, six of the more interesting structures might include:

• Perry’s Studio, 901 Main, Built 1895, mixed commercial and residence, one-story, flat-topped, stamped metal facing
• L.H. Boylon House, 920 Main, Built 1918, American Craftsman Bungalow
• William Moore House, 921 Main, Built 1904, designed by Glenn L. Saxton in Colonial Revival style
• EP Wanzer House, 1203 Main, Built 1895, Queen Anne with a 2-story Victorian tower
• Scholes-Chesley House, 1209 Main, Built circa 1900, Colonial Revival style
• Dr. Sam Carney House, 1301 Main, Built circa 1894, Queen Anne style with cross-gable roof, probably the oldest of the district

Steele designed a concrete dairy barn for the Yankton State Hospital, but that's quite a ways east.

I'm compiling a list of additional Steele buildings in Nebraska, South Dakota, and Iowa. Enjoy the trip! --Frankie Rae (talk) 20:41, 6 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Back from Lake Andes, and I've started processing my photos. I've edited and uploaded the new exterior shots, which are in Commons:Category:Charles Mix County Courthouse.

Beautiful interior—and I've got 100 photos of it to go through (not all distinct: I took a lot of repeats, to ensure that at least one of my low-light shots wouldn't be blurred). It'll probably be a while before I get them uploaded. Will let you know when I do.

Didn't make it to Armour: it was another 22 miles. Moreover, I was having a bit of trouble with the light: at about the time that the sun moved far enough north of west to light the courthouse's north face well, a bank of clouds slid over it and put the building in shade again. Eventually got my north-face shots, but spent a lot of time waiting and hoping for little gaps in the cloud. Ammodramus (talk) 12:25, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Three months later, the interior photos are finally up. I apologize for the delay; it's been a somewhat busy three months, and the number of photos made this project somewhat intimidating, which brought out my natural tendency to procrastinate.

The interior, particularly on the first floor, wasn't easy to shoot. The lighting was somewhat dim, which made hand-held shots difficult; and if an exterior window is in the frame, it tends to glare. Unfortunately, using flash wasn't a good option either: the only one I have is the flash that's part of my camera, and that tended to wash out the detail of the terra-cotta.

Note that on the interior of the building, the mortar in the horizontal joints in the brickwork is recessed, as it was on the exterior of the Woodbury County courthouse and the Sioux City First Cong'l Church. The depth of the raking is similar: about half the diameter of a quarter, or about half an inch. When I found this, I took another look at the mortar on the exterior of the building. Although I've got no eye for it, the exterior mortar looked somewhat new. I wonder whether the exterior mortar has been replaced or re-pointed, and whether the people who did it didn't realize that the deep raking was intentional.

At your request, got several shots of the drinking fountain. It doesn't have a mosaic behind it, as your sources suggested, but terra-cotta ornamentation. Ammodramus (talk) 02:56, 12 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry it's been so busy, but I recognize the feeling. I have some sense of the difficulty of photographing in dim indoor spaces, but these images are lovely! I'm particularly impressed (and pleased) with the images of the dome, which must have been quite difficult to capture against the glare.

Your observations on the mortar are tantalizing. I had previously noticed that the water table and foundation appeared to have been recently painted. I wonder if they did some general work on the exterior without the knowledge or perhaps the funding to restore the original raking?

--Frankie Rae (talk) 21:39, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Dennis Utter is a former town resident. In fact he's a past Mayor and City Council member. A google search[7] produces this[8] at the very top of the page. Your mistake. In the future, if I add someone and you're not sure why I did, drop me a note on my talk page. I'm here almost every day(But next Jun 15-17 I will be around very little. My wife is having a outpatient medical procedure done on the 15th) and will get back to you promptly without blowing your head off.
• Ralph Brooks. His listing at Political Graveyard, an excellent source for background on state legislators and one of my first choices for info, made no mention of McCook. I didn't know about this.[9]. My mistake so we're even.
• The prose. First I felt listing the governors one by one was better, baseball player or athlete entries usually just say what sport they played. Norris was influential but where do you draw what to say or not to say? Nelson is a past Governor, I'm sure he has some worthy accomplishments. If you allow summaries, people are also going to edit in bad things about these people and if they're true, it would be hard to justify taking them down. The bit about the Norris home might be better off in the cultural part of the article.
• Some state legislator articles. I had to remove copyrighted material from DiAnna Schimek and ‎[[David I. Maurstad].
• What would you think if I added politicians(or other notable people. Former Miss Nebraskas for example) who don't have a article to town articles but with a reference from a reliable source(Political graveyard, Miss Nebraska website, etc) to backup their notability?
• With a few articles I changed the way they're ordered. See Also comes before References, which comes before External Links. Cultural mentions(Smithville was a filming location for the movie 'The Monster that ate Kansas'. That kind of stuff.) and notable people come on top of those. Misordering doesn't arise too often but what do you think?
• Per WP:EL there really shouldn't be external links in the text of a article. I try changing these into IC. Sometimes I eliminate See Also stuff. Especially if they're two links in the article already to the SA topic.
• Why does there have to be a 'People from Bassett Nebraska' category? Population is 619 and the category has one entry and more entries are likely to be long in coming.(County categories even if there is only 1 person, are fine with me. I recently created People from category pages for Garfield, Pierce, Fillmore, Dixon, Hamilton, Morrill, and Kimball Counties) There are towns in Nebraska more worthy of its own category, McCook for one. I created a People from Hastings Nebraska category recently.
• Write back here when you have time. I'll be keeping an eye out....William 17:19, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the note. You've raised a number of points, and I'll have to think about some of them before I respond. For now, though, let me wish your wife the best on her medical procedure. Ammodramus (talk) 17:53, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't had the chance to think through all the points you brought up; but will mention a few things.

Re. "People from..." categories: My opinion's probably not very useful on that. I've had little to do with the category system in WP (as opposed to Commons, where I find myself creating a lot of categories and not infrequently getting involved in recategorization efforts). I'd be inclined to say that "People from..." categories should be fairly large, running to states and to large cities. On a smaller scale, I'd say that the "Notable people" sections in articles would be a better way of presenting that information than the category system.

One problem with "People from..." categories is that people move; sometimes, move a lot. For example, a few months back I was involved in a discussion regarding the author Willa Cather, who was born in Virginia, moved to Nebraska in her childhood and grew up there, lived in Pittsburgh for some years, then moved to New York, but also (if I remember correctly) had a summer home in the Canadian Maritimes. For that matter, Dennis Utter, according to the Omaha World-Herald obituary cited in the article, grew up in Wyoming and held political office while living in both McCook, Nebraska and Hastings, Nebraska. If someone's moved fairly often, then their article could wind up in a long stack of "People from" categories.

Re. external links: I agree 100%. I try to do that myself; or, not infrequently, I eliminate the link altogether, since a great many of them tend to be promotional. I agree with you on the overuse of "See also", as well. If the article's Wikilinked in the appropriate section, there's no need for a see-also; and I've run into cases where people have added see-alsos that lead to very minimal stubs, with no additional information to speak of.

Re. ordering of sections: I generally try to follow the order laid out at WP:WikiProject Cities/US Guideline, although I think there've been cases where it seemed more logical to place "Infrastructure" immediately after "Geography" or "Economy". Ordering is a perennial problem—we get lots of good-faith edits, especially by IP editors, who seem to toss their information onto the page and leave it wherever it may happen to land. They also tend not to use the preview button... but I feel a rant coming on, and I'd better choke it off.

Re. copyvio: That's another thing I spend a lot of time tracking down on my watchlist. It's common enough that if an IP editor introduces a long passage with reasonably good writing and no footnotes, I routinely Google a distinctive-looking phrase to see if it's cut-and-pasted from a copyrighted source. Glad that you caught it in the Schimek and Maurstad articles.

I need to do some further thinking about some of the other points in your post, and will try to respond to them later. Again, thanks for bringing them up; and again, good luck to your wife on the forthcoming procedure. Ammodramus (talk) 23:58, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the well wishes. I'll reply when you're totally done commenting....William 00:16, 9 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's taken me forever to get back to this, for which I apologize. I've been trying to organize my thoughts on some of your points, and my thoughts have resisted organization.

First, an easy point: I'm sorry about the deletion of Dennis Utter from the McCook article. I looked at the DU article, and at least at that time it didn't mention McCook; moreover, he was elected in a legislative district that wasn't particularly close to McCook. After your note above, I checked the World-Herald obituary cited in the article, and found that he'd actually been mayor in McCook before moving to Hastings.

Re. addition of notable-people with citations, even if no WP article: I have no problem whatsoever with this. Indeed, I'd rather that all such additions had citations, whether or not there was a WP article. For one thing, someone might add a person to the list based on an error in the person's article (for example, the Loup County/Loup City problem you ran down in the Edward L. Thrasher article—and, by the way, when I next get to Loup City, I'll see if I can find an old yearbook or something in the library to help resolve that). To me, this comes perilously close to using WP as a source.

Re. prose, I strongly prefer it to bullet lists, although the problem you mentioned certainly exists: that the brief descriptions will get expanded into mini-articles on the people. One thing I like about prose is that it gives us a way to organize the people by their areas of notability, with a new paragraph for each area. "Notable political figures from Jonesville include..." (new paragraph) "Several Jonesville residents have achieved some prominence in the sphere of arts and literature, including..." (new paragraph) "Professional athletes who have lived in Jonesville include..."

Another thing I like about prose accounts of notables, or rather that I dislike about bullet lists, is that the lists offer an easy template for inappropriate edits: both for the high-school wag who decides to add one of his friends as a billionaire industrialist, and for the good-faith editor who thinks that the wrestling coach should be on the list because he's taken the team to the state tournament twice. A great many people seem to be intimidated by the thought of writing an English sentence; and they tend to be the sort of people whose contributions take a lot of reverting or fixing. I suspect that they're much more likely to cut, paste, and modify an entry in a list than to generate actual English prose.

Think that these cover all the points you raised. Again, I apologize for taking so long to respond (and for responding at such inordinate length when I did). Look forward to your reply, when you're able to make one; and again, if it's not too much repetition, I hope that all goes well for your wife tomorrow. Ammodramus (talk) 18:53, 14 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Since you've been all over the state, it's my guess that you've been to the capitol in Lincoln. I just noticed that the building was built before the House got abolished, and I'm curious — do you know what they do with the old House chambers? The article on the capitol building doesn't even discuss the House. Nyttend (talk) 23:28, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hurried response: here's a page from the capitol website with a bit about it. Googling "warner legislative chamber" would probably turn up more information about current uses. Ammodramus (talk) 00:02, 9 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Ammodramus. Thanks for fixing the Wikilink in Incident at Hawk's Hill. I should have been more careful, since I'm the daughter of a birder and from NE CO, I am aware that there's more than one type of Prairie Chicken. I don't know how you noticed the mistake, but I appreciate your getting it right. Tlqk56 (talk) 19:09, 13 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks—I happened to be editing to correct an adverbial "everyday", and my eye fell on the "Tympanuchus" in the edit window. As a birder myself, I had to check up on that, and then to see if I couldn't refine it. Ammodramus (talk) 19:17, 13 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, this is just to let you know that I have granted you the "autopatrolled" permission. This won't affect your editing, it just automatically marks any page you create as patrolled, benefiting new page patrollers. You seem to have a solid grasp of our notability, verifiability, copyright, and (although you've dealt with these less, so far as I noticed) biography of living persons policies. I came to this conclusion based on a review of several of your article creations, a review of your user talk page, a few of the very small number of deleted contributions you have and some examples of your participation at AfD. I noticed your account because of a recent comment you made at AfD, it impressed me enough to look farther. If for any reason you'd prefer not to be flagged this way, please let me know and I'll gladly hit "undo". Anyway, cheers! --j⚛e decker^talk 03:03, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your flattering vote of confidence in giving me "autopatrolled" status. You mentioned that your attention was drawn by a comment I'd made at AfD; if it wouldn't be too much trouble, could you let me know which one? I'm relatively new to the AfD process, and it'd help me to know when I've done it right, in the view of more experienced editors. (I'll also try to respond appropriately to criticism, but I much prefer compliments.) Thanks. Ammodramus (talk) 03:21, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, it was your "embarrassed comment" at Clint Coley, which I felt a proactive and responsible response to a minor (and apparently rare) mistake. In looking through others where your !vote ended up different than consensus, I saw things like this one, and again, clue seemed evidenced. (I didn't focus on AfD, so this shouldn't be considered a strong review of all that work, but the few examples I looked at confirmed the general impression I got from the rest of the edits I observed.)--j⚛e decker^talk 03:28, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the reply. I'm glad some good came out of my Coley screw-up. (Since I've created an average of less than ten articles a year, I don't suppose that the autopatrolled status is saving the new-page patrollers a lot of work; but every little bit helps.) Ammodramus (talk) 03:35, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If that's what you call a screw-up, you're doing a lot better than most of us. And yeah, it doesn't make much of a difference individually, but over a couple thousand people it definitely adds up. --j⚛e decker^talk 03:40, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Some copy-edits would probably help quite a bit. Anything you can do would be very much appreciated. I figured I'd roll the old dice, especially seeing that the worst that can happen is a fail. I've taken care of the refs, switching the primary ones over to sfn temps and making sure everything is properly cited. As TTT said, the review might get picked up quick because of the drive.