Talk:Bruce Castle/GA1

GA Review

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Overview of GA Review (see here for criteria)

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1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (no original research):

3. It is broad in its coverage

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   a (fair representation): b (all significant views):

5. It is stable.

   Low volume of edit activity; no edit wars apparent.

6. It contains images, where possible, to illustrate the topic.

   a (copyright tagged and captioned): b (appropriate use; lack of images does not in itself exclude GA):

7. Overall:

   a Pass/Fail:

This is an interesting little article. It's generally very well written; I've brought up a few minor things below. Please take a look over these, and we can move from there. –Whitehorse1 00:01, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Update: I apologise for my delay with this review. I've been a little under the weather, these past couple've days. I hope to give this appropriate attention over the next 24hrs or so. Thanks kindly. Whitehorse1 21:50, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Well written requirement

• "Believed to have been built on the site of an earlier manor house about which little is known" You could add an em or en dash between 'house' and 'about'.
  • I've added a comma. I don't think a dash is appropriate as it breaks the flow, while parentheses would be too intrusive. – iridescent 00:36, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
• "Sources disagree on the house's initial construction date, and no records survive of its construction." This, is exceptionally well phrased and handled. Well done.
• Occasionally you drop into using passive voice in the article, which detracts from the flow and impact of your writing. You can often make the sentence punchier by changing it to use active voice. ✓ Done –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
  • If you mean the "2nd Baron was succeeded by the 3rd Baron" usages, they're intentional, to keep the names in chronological order as much as possible. In usages such as "The name of "Bruce Castle" first appears to have been adopted by Henry Hare, 2nd Baron Coleraine" it's also intentional, as rewording into the active voice would make the text clumsy in my opinion ("Henry Hare appears to have first adopted the name…"); likewise the assorted "the house was owned by…"s. On a ctrl-f search for "by", I can't see any instances where there's an obvious potential for improvement. I know American English frowns on the passive voice, but this is an article in British English on a British topic, so The Elements of Style has no relevance (the closest British equivalent, the Times Style Guide, expresses no opinion on the matter. – iridescent 00:36, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
    • American English is distinguished from British English in several regards, yes. The view active voice is preferable is not limited to American English. I do own a copy of Strunk & White's work The Elements of Style, but the preferred grammatical voice messrs. Strunk and White espouse is by no means limited to that style guide. It would be quite wrong to blindly follow a principle in opposition to common sense, and wrong to attempt to force that personal preference on others. Rather, this is a principle of good, clear prose; that is one of the good article assessment criteria. For example, The Economist Style Guide publisher: Profile Books Ltd. (London), hardback ed., printed in Great Britain ISBN 1-86197-916-9 urges during its introduction: 'Keep in mind George Orwell's six elementary rules ("Politics and the English Language", 1946): 6 Never use the passive where you can use the active'. (On a technical point, it's The Times with the leading article italicized (pet peeve).) Reading through the article I noticed several uses of passive voice—many of which were not only appropriate but the most effective choice for the sentence. By contrast, at times I felt the impact could be further strengthened in a particular part by adjusting to active voice. If you would like me to try to provide particular examples, please do let me know. If on further examination none suggest themselves, naturally I'll strike this item; I asked you take another look over the article for it purely from having that impression upon reading through. –Whitehorse1 01:25, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
      • I've removed three examples of the passive voice; I can't see any other instances where rewording into the active voice won't be a net negative. The successions "x was succeeded by y" I've already covered; the only other two instances I see are "In the early 17th century the house was owned by Richard Sackville, 3rd Earl of Dorset and Lady Anne Clifford" and "alleged transgressions were tried by a court of pupils", and in both of these cases I think rewording into active forms will make the text unnecessarily clumsy; the significant objects are the house and the transgressions respectively. – iridescent 12:38, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the changes you made. I think those parts look much better (e.g. part about the ghost). Some suggestions follow.

• "Believed to have been built on the site of an earlier manor house, about which little is known, the current house is one of the oldest surviving English houses to be built in brick."

'oldest surviving brick(-)built English houses'?

Change it if you think it's an improvement; I've no strong opinion either way. This particularly phrasing is because there was originally a "primarily" in there which I removed as superfluous. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "A detached Tudor round tower stands immediately to the southeast of the house, and is generally considered to be the earliest part of the building; however, Lysons believes it to have been a later addition."

'Lysons believes it is a later addition'?

• No, I think the present tense would be inappropriate here – although it would still be grammatically correct, this is a sentence about the distant past. I'd go with "was a later addition" if you really want to lose the "to have been". – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "There is some archaeological evidence for parts of the building dating to the 15th century"
  Some ambiguity here. Perhaps '...evidence parts of the building date to the 15th century' or similar. Or, 'Archaeological evidence dates parts (of the building) to the 15th century'. There're a few options, depending on what you want it to say.

I want it to say "there is some archaeological evidence for parts of the building dating to the 15th century" ☺. The archaeological evidence is ambiguous so "evidence dates parts to the 15th century" etc would ascribe a degree of certainty that doesn't exist; see the diagram on p583 of Pevsner. It's not clear whether any part of the 15th century structure remains and impossible to say with certainty. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

On that basis...it's not ambiguous. *g* Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "...when Henry VIII met his sister Margaret, Queen of Scots at "Maister Compton's House beside Tottenham"

Add comma after Scots?

✓ Done – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "However, in resemblance the house appears to favour the style of Burton Agnes Hall constructed between 1601 and 1610."

'Aesthetically the house...'?

That's Giano, and I'm loathe to amend any architectural writing by Giano without good reason, as he's a true expert on architectural terminology and I'm not. I don't think "aesthetic" is an appropriate word here, as aesthetics refers specifically to attractiveness and impact, rather than to architectural style. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Ah, Giano. He's not someone I've interacted with much, but I know of him. He does have a certain, je-ne-sais-quoi in terms of panache, non? :) He's probably a better writer than me, too. I'm happy to defer to his expertise here. –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "The narrow east front was remodelled into an entrance front, and given the appearance of a typical Georgian house, while the gabled attics on the south front were removed, giving the south facade the appearance it has today."

For the first dependent clause, why not just 'in Georgian style'?

"In Georgian style" would change the meaning; it's not that the building was remodelled to look like a Georgian manor house, but that the narrow side of the Tudor house was remodelled to resemble the front of a Georgian house (as opposed to manor house). – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "Hill and his brothers had taken over the management of their father's school in Birmingham in 1819, which moved to Bruce Castle in 1827 with Rowland Hill as Headmaster."

I felt the tone of this a little 'bedtime storyish'.

Not sure what you mean here. Hill's father managed a school in Birmingham; the brothers took it over in 1819 and moved to London in 1827, with Hill as Headmaster. It all needs to be mentioned, to make it clear that it was an already-existing institution taking the house over; how would you word it differently? – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "The school was run along radical lines inspired by Hill's friends Thomas Paine, Richard Price and Joseph Priestley; all teaching was on the principle that the role of the teacher is to instill the desire to learn, not to impart facts, corporal punishment was abolished and alleged transgressions were tried by a court of pupils, while the school taught a radical (for the time) curriculum including foreign languages, science and engineering."

Something of a run-on sentence. It's very long.

Yes but not unreasonably so, and I can't see any obvious point to break the sentence. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

It's the last part (while...) which jarred for me. I played around with the sentence a little (66 words vs. 72), but tbh I'm not sure about my altered version either:

"The school taught a radical (for the time) curriculum including foreign languages, science and engineering. Inspired by friends Thomas Paine, Richard Price and Joseph Priestley, Hill and his brothers devised progressive methods: they abolished corporal punishment and introduced a pupil-led court system to try alleged transgressions; they believed the principle role of the teacher is to instill the desire to learn, not to impart facts."

 –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "Historically, Tottenham had consisted"

No. Tottenham had consisted of separated villages; at this point it didn't. The current wording is grammatically and technically correct; "Historically, Tottenham consisted" isn't. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Let's strike this item. –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "The grounds of the house were opened to the public as Bruce Castle Park in June 1892, the first public park in Tottenham. The house opened to the public as Bruce Castle Museum in 1906."

You could strike the words above; you may prefer the rhythm of your existing version though.

I have a marginal preference for keeping "of the house" to make it clear we're not talking about a separate estate attached to the house – but I'm not losing sleep either way. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Duly kept. –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "housing a permanent exhibition on the past, present and future of Haringey and its predecessor boroughs"
  Does 'future' refer to things like plans/mock-ups of planned new buildings?

It refers to whatever changes are proposed at that given time. Sometimes this will be new buildings; sometimes this will be new road and rail schemes; sometimes (as with the development of Wood Green Shopping City, for example), it might focus on demolition. To be honest, I really don't think it needs to be explained in detail what a local authority museum does. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, it just sounded a bit crystal ball-ish on first read. –Whitehorse1 07:01, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• "In July 2006 the grounds were the location of a major community archaeological dig ... in which large numbers of local youths took part."

I paused at the last part there. Is the bit about local participance already implied by the word community? Mentioning youth seemed out of place, as if perhaps you sought to make clear 'not all youths are bad'. After reviewing the source for that bit, which showed lots of local children taking part, I can see how it might belong. Please take another look though.

As you say, if you look at the source you'll see it was specifically a youth initiative, with archaeologists supervising a large group of kids doing the actual digging. Since this is most definitely not the way a normal archaeological dig is organised, I think it ought to be mentioned. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• "chalk foundations of what appear to be an earlier house on the site were exposed" - discovered? ✓ Done

Agree that makes more sense; changed. – iridescent 17:43, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Other points

• The {{London museums}} template at the bottom doesn't actually include this (Bruce Castle) museum. I don't know if it should; just mentioning it in case.
  • Don't think it should; it's not a significant enough museum to warrant inclusion (there are thousands of museums in London). I've added {{LB Haringey}} as well, which is probably more relevant and does list Bruce Castle (I think both should stay). – iridescent 17:48, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

• The various ISBNs were formatted inconsistently. For consistency, I've corrected these so they are syntactically valid. ✓ Done
• I'm not sure what's up with the bluelinked 'Cherry & Pevsner' hyperlinks but they do not lead anywhere. It looks like they're supposed to point to the book source.
  • This is a problem which comes up whenever Pevsner is used as a source; it's convention always to cite books in the Buildings of England series as "Pevsner" (see Pevsner), but Pevsner died in 1983 and isn't the actual author of most of the series – but wiki templates can't cope with this. I don't know a way around this. – iridescent 17:48, 19 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Thank you for explaining it to me.

Images

• Are you able to provide further details of the source for File:Bruce castle 1.jpg? Currently it has a photographer (or picture provider) name, though no further details or link.
  • It's the picture that was on the stub article when I first came to the page. While there are plenty of other usable images in Commons:Category:Bruce Castle, I dislike replacing images unless the replacement is a clear improvement; I know how irritating it is to have something you've worked on discarded for no apparent reason. The image is hosted at Commons, not en-wiki, and has been there for four years now without any issues, so I assume it's valid. – iridescent 00:36, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
  • The photograph is the prolific Fin Fahey's own work (his user name was "Tarquin Binary" - but he seems to have left wikipedia}. He's taken a lot of pix for wiki around E.London. Is there any adjustment necessary to the commons description? Kbthompson (talk) 09:12, 18 March 2009 (UTC)
    • No, it's fine. At least one of the other pics used came from him, and also links to his Flickr account (which mentions his account here); there's no reason either to assume any of the images'll be removed from the article.
• For File:Lordship House, Tottenham 1619.jpg, you give the source "Tottenham Parish Plan 1619". Is this what the image is, or is it a plan by the Parish? What is the source from which you obtained the image?
  • It has no official title. When using exerpts from it, I generally credit is as "The Earl of Dorset's Survey of Tottenham 1619", but "Tottenham Parish Plan" is just is accurate; it's (as the name suggests) a plan of the historic parish of Tottenham, commissioned by Richard Sackville, 3rd Earl of Dorset (himself an occupant of Bruce Castle) and executed in 1619. The eastern section from which the close-up image of the house is taken is at File:1619 Tottenham map (full).jpg; it turns up in virtually every book about Tottenham and to be honest I couldn't say for sure from which this particular usage was scanned. Again, it's Commons rather than en-wiki hosted so any issues are for Commons to resolve. (Dating from 1619, there's no reasonable doubt that it's in the public domain). To save you time, there are no en-wiki hosted images on this article and no Commons images subject to any dispute, so the only issues regarding images will be placement and appropriateness. – iridescent 00:36, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

I re-examined and carefully considered all images. Please understand, GA reviewers are required to apply the criteria uniformly irrespective of their personal views. No reviewer goes out seeking to purge content or images from nominated articles 'with a smile on their lips and a song in their heart'. If a reviewer was to do so, I'd hope the community would adequately address their dubious conduct. The purpose, of reviewing non-free images used under an assertion of free use or free-use images, is one of conformance (Safe Harbor Provisions, and other arcana), not malice.

Time saving hints are always welcome! Reviewers are charged, under the project criteria, to assess images for copyright tagging, validity of any fair use rationales, topic-relevancy and captions; a particular image repository cannot allow them a head-in-the-sand approach. For the record, I thought your article was well-illustrated with thoughtfully chosen images. I originally asked because it seemed unclear it (the map) wasn't a recently-drawn illustration. Another look, coupled with the extra details you gave, completely satisfy me as to its vintage and free status.

All images are fine, as you said they'd be.:

• Lordship House, Tottenham 1619

As above.

• Tottenham,Bruce Castle, Tower

Building in public grounds; CC attribution licensed via Flickr. Source checks out and all appropriate data provided and valid. All requirements met: Yes.

• Richard Sackville Earl of Dorset

It's often useful, though optional, to add the date of a painting to the caption (here, 1613). This is a copy of photographic reproduction made on an original two-dimensional work of art. The original work is out of copyright and public domain. That the image is scanned from a recent book is immaterial: the subsequent work cannot assert copyright protection beyond that of the original. All requirements met: Yes (under WMF position).

• Bruce Castle Park

Dual-licensed - GFDL and CC attribution licenses. Grounds of building open to public; itself publicly open. Free image with valid license inc. source information.

• Early facade of Bruce Castle

Minor typo in the Author field "Late 17th or eatly 18th century drawing; original author unknown"; obviously it doesn't matter much. Incidentally, as a shorter work, 'Tottenham Revisited' is usually placed in quotation marks instead of italic face. Again, not a blocker to passing. Free-use image. Appropriate {{PD-old}} use. All requirements met: Yes.

• Rowland Hill - Project Gutenberg etext 13103

Certainly public domain, though a date (for the caption) would be nice. The book it's taken from Great Britain and Her Queen, Keeling 2nd ed., is 1897 (so, could put circa 1897); the illustration itself could be earlier though. All requirements met: Yes.

• Bruce Castle north elevation; Bruce Castle extension; Bruce Castle extension entrance

License: Dual, as above. Assertion of freedom of panorama per S62 Copyright Designs & Patents Act 1988 c.48 is valid. All requirements met: Yes.

• Bruce Castle postboxes

License: Dual-licensed as above. Period Royal Mail postboxes are reasonably considered (in my view) as a 'work of artistic craftsmanship'. All requirements met: Yes.

References

• "The alignment of streets in the area is preserved today; the road running east-west is the present day Lordship Lane, and that running north-south past the church is the present day Church Lane" ✓ Done
• "Neither the depiction of the house nor the church is architecturally accurate."

Wording on these seems awkward.

• Fixed the former. Regarding the latter, I can't see an obvious way to resolve it – "neither the depiction of the house nor the depiction of the church are architecturally accurate" or "the house and church are both shown in a manner which is not architecturally accurate" are even clumsier. – iridescent 17:02, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

• "A printing press designed by Rowland Hill and built by pupils of the school is currently on display at London's Science Museum."

Avoid statements which date quickly. I don't know how often Science Museum curators change exhibits; I'd strike 'currently' though.✓ Done

• Removed "currently". AFAIK no permanent exhibit has ever been removed from the Science Museum other than to be transferred to another museum, so I think it's reasonable to assume it will remain on display throughout the lifespan of Wikipedia. – iridescent 17:02, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

• You've given a source "Heraud, John Abraham (1835). "Tottenham: A Poem". http://198.82.142.160/spenser/TextRecord.php?action=GET&textsid=39266. Retrieved on 2008-10-02." for a poem. The URL looks odd initially but is fine—the site ("English Poetry 1579-1830", produced by David H. Radcliffe Department of English Virginia Tech) checks out as a reliable source. The site cited though gives the date 1820? ✓ Done
  • Good point. The 1835 date came from this page, but a look at the frontispiece of the original book clearly shows 1820 as the correct date. Good catch! (I think the "English Poetry" site is a better source than citing the original poem, as it includes the commentary which confirms that Bruce Castle is the building referred to in the poem.) – iridescent 17:02, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

• The Joseph Priestley Word document reference style & wording is identical to the from Rowland Hill (postal reformer) article. The reference is somewhat jumbled though: it links to the document on a website, then points out it was reprinted in a particular book (missing an ISBN incidentally); the book doesn't also appear in the document. ✓ Done

In my opinion the website is a reliable source, edited by Dr Malcolm Dick. It appears to come under the umbrella of local government. It reads: "The project (The Revolutionary Players Project) was initiated by The Libraries Partnership - West Midlands, which becomes part of Museums, Libraries and Archives - West Midlands in April 2003. ...financed by the New Opportunities Fund, which distributes National Lottery money and awards grants.."

If you just consulted the website document as the reference, cite that; if you used the book, it's appropriate to just cite that with a page range. The ISBN is 1-85858-269-5. The document, can be cited as something like: <ref>{{cite web |title=Joseph Priestley and his Influence on Education in Birmingham |publisher=[http://www.search.revolutionaryplayers.org.uk/engine/resource/exhibition/standard/default.asp?resource=4276 Revolutionary Players of Industry and Innovation] |last=Dick |first=Malcolm |year=2004 |url = http://www.search.revolutionaryplayers.org.uk/content/files/88/83/366.doc |format = {{DOClink|65&nbsp;KB}} |accessdate = 2009-03-16}}</ref>

• As you say, this was cut-and-pasted from the Rowland Hill article. I agree with you, and have change the citation accordingly. (I do think it's a valid source, but agree that it's misleading to imply it's the book as opposed to the website being cited). – iridescent 17:03, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

The article will pass. There're some things above to look over, and where necessary change. After that we can tie things up. Thanks. –Whitehorse1 00:48, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Final comments

Thank you for nominating your article for GA. All the effort you, and other editors, put in has paid off: it's a fine article and worthy of Good Article status. I'm passing the article now. –Whitehorse1 05:40, 23 March 2009 (UTC)