Talk:Farrand & Votey Organ Company/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Hurricanehink (talk · contribs) 02:23, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

The article feels very underdeveloped. I approach this article as a musician. I play piano and own an organ, so this drew my interest. Here's my review.

@Hurricanehink: - Thanks for the early review, as I realize there normally is several months lag in response from a GA Reviewer. I am starting to respond to your issues and will work on it daily to make these improvements. When I am finished with a particular section you raised of issues I will then give the  Done template and sign it (to indicate I am completely done with that section). I realize then you probably will have additional comments and issues. THEN I will give it my best attempt to answer these additional issues. I normally get hard copy books from the library and ILL, however all the libraries in Michigan are closed. Michigan is having a hard time with the coronavirus. As you probably already know Michigan is the third amount of cases after New York and New Jersey. I will then give the best reply I can off Google Books, web-pages, and news clips from my free subscription of Newspaper.com I got from the Wikipedia Library.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 15:44, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for the quick reply and doing the edits so far. I've been following Covid too closely - I'm in the state with the 2nd most number of states ._. I hope you're safe and healthy up in Michigan! No worries if you need to take longer getting to all of these edits. Already, I can tell that the improved article structure makes it feel more complete. Keep up the good work, I'll wait til you're done :) ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 21:12, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

• "The company produced 7,200 instruments a year which were sold worldwide. " - that feels more like a merchandising gimmick. The article doesn't back up the bit about it being worldwide, nor does it say for how long. Also, later, you say "The factory had the capacity to produce 600 pianos, organs, and mechanical piano players per month or 7200 units per year. " The keyword there is in bold. Did it actually do this?

 Done Rephrased lede to 7,200 instruments a year by 1889, which is backed-up by news clip ref #3 ("Growth of Farrand & Votey Organ Company's business"). The news clip article says at the beginning In 1883 but 767 organs were built and sold... From that I presume they meant the additional numbers at the additional times the company "built and sold" these other later organs.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 15:13, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

• The lead feels like it falls short. You don't talk about the end of the company, or its owners, or when it was founded.

 Done - expanded the lead accordingly.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 19:11, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

• The article structure seems lacking. You could talk about the company timeline as one section (history) and have a merchandise/sales as another section, or some variant, where you can also mention the paragraph starting with "The firm sometimes constructed impressively large organs." You should compare the article to other historic companies, and see how best to structure the article (as opposed to one singular "Background" section)

 Done - Broke "Background" into History and Merchandise sections.

• "The origin of the Farrand & Votey Organ Company dates back to 1881 when the Detroit Organ Company was formed." - by whom?

 Done - copy edited accordingly and you will find it at the first sentence of the new History section.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 12:09, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

• "The company was then renamed the Farrand & Votey Organ Company." - in 1887?.

 Done - Clarified. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 12:17, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

• You don't actually talk about the machine, or the process, of making the organs.

 Done See new sections of Reed Organ construction and Pipe organ construction. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 10:47, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

• "These instruments were sold throughout the United States and Canada. The company also had markets for its products in Europe and Australia" - so was it actually sold in Europe and Australia?

 Done - Detroit Free Press newspaper clip reference says These organs excel not only from a mechanical but also from a musical standpoint and the company's trade has been extended not only to every part of the United States but also largely to foreign countries, the entire civilized world being embraced in the company's operations. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 16:47, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

• Are there any other notable buildings containing this organ? Are there any still in existence?

 Done - see section Current surviving organ installations --Doug Coldwell (talk) 16:47, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

• "There were over twelve hundred people in attendance." - per WP:MOS, this should be "1,200 people"

 Done - corrected per WP:MOS. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 19:02, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

• "After the Chicago's World Fair the organ was moved to the University of Michigan." - in 1893?

 Done - clarified in Merchandise section.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 18:39, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

• "The firm broke up amicably in 1897 and the pipe organ business became the Votey Organ Company.[9] The reed organ business became the Farrand Organ Company." - what happened of these businesses? Surely that should be part of the article history.

 Done - Make a Demise section that explains all this and continues on with the demise history. --17:27, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

So the article seems a bit incomplete. I won't fail the GAN, since you might be able to address these issues within seven days. Let me know if you have any questions about the review. I enjoyed reading it, and the writing was cohesive and clear, so don't feel dejected. I enjoyed learning a bit of music history. ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:23, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

@Hurricanehink: All issues addressed. Please take a look at it again. Thanks.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 10:47, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Wow, what a difference! This is a much better article than what was there before. Sorry to be picky, but could you reword a bit of the new section "Reed_organ_construction" and remove any of the references to "you"/"your"? Wikipedia isn't supposed to be self-referential. Other than that, I'm quite happy with the progress of the article, really good work over the last week ^_^ ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 15:33, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the nice comments. Absolutely, I'll address the issues you brought up and see if I can't correct them accordingly. I'll start to work on those immediately.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 18:59, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

 Done - changed "you" and "your" to the organist.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 19:24, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm happy to pass the article! The article looks so much more complete. Great work :) ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 19:38, 8 April 2020 (UTC)