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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was promoted by Ian Rose 10:03, 4 March 2013 (UTC) [1].[reply]

Laura Secord

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Laura Secord (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Curly Turkey (gobble) 21:36, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured article because I think it is a comprehensive article on the Chocoloate Lady this War of 1812 heroine, and an important part of early Canadian mythology.

Ideally, I'd like to see it as Today's Featured Article on 22 June 2013, which is the 200th anniversary of her famous walk through enemy-controlled territory to inform the British of an impending American attack. Curly Turkey (gobble) 21:36, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Review by Rschen7754

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This is my first full review of a non-road FAC, so I won't be supporting or opposing until others review.

Personal history
Memory and legend

Review by Dank

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Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk)

  • Hi Curly, thanks for bringing this to FAC. The lead needs to be longer; about twice as long would do it, as long as it does a good job summarizing the article. I'll be back with more a little later. - Dank (push to talk) 18:55, 19 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oh, dear. Oh, deary, deary, dear. Natty10000 doesn't seem to agree, as s/he has gutted the lead not just once (18 January), but twice (19 January) since I've submitted this article for FAC. Curly Turkey (gobble) 21:58, 19 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Okay, don't do anything with it yet, I'll go ask Natty what's up. - Dank (push to talk) 22:08, 19 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • I think we can compromise here; I agree that it has a bit more detail than it needs, and I'll trim a bit. See what you think. - Dank (push to talk) 22:37, 19 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • I certainly don't have any problem with a trimming, but cutting out the info about the chocolate company is a big mistake. It can hardly be understated how strongly Canadians associated her name with chocolates, even amongst those familiar with the historical Secord. The first thing most Canadians think of when you mention her name is chocolates. In fact, I first visited the article myself to find out when she founded "her" chocolate company. I think it's important to emphasize they she is both unrelated to the chocolate company, and that her name is strongly associated with the chocolate company amongst Canadians. Otherwise, Canadians (who will almost certainly be the vast majority of readers) will be confused as to her relation with the company (as I was).
            • I didn't cut the information out of the article, I just reduced the bit in the lead to "Laura Secord Chocolates are named for her." Change it however you want ... but if it feels too much like "product placement", then I'll stop here. - Dank (push to talk) 00:45, 20 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
              • I do undertand the "product placement" concerns, but please keep in mind that a quite significant number (quite likely a majority) of Canadian readers who come to this article will be curious about her realtion to the chocolate company. "Laura Secord Chocolates are named after her" only raises more questions than it answers. The fact that the fame of the chocolate company far overshadows Secord's own has more than one reference in the article, and I'm sure I could come up with more with little effort.
              • How about something like this? —
                Before: "On the centennial of her walk, businessman Frank Patrick O'Connor named Laura Secord Chocolates in her honour; it became the most successful candy retailer in Canada, and though the historical Secord and her family had no relation to it, amongst Canadians her name is most often associated with the candy company."
                After: "Though the historical Secord and her family had no relation to it, most Canadians associate her name with the Laura Secord Chocolates company, which was named in her honour on the centennial of her walk."
              • I'm not really sure it's a good idea to leave out the "Canada's most successful candy retailer"; while I sympathise with the "product placement" concern, it does give context for non-Canadian readers—as in: why would Canadians associate her name with a candy company, and even if they do, why does it have to be in the lead?
          • If you're going to do more more trimming to the lead, there's one more detail I think is important not to lose: that her father fought on the American side in the Revolutionary war. Before I atrarted editing it, the article claimed Thomas Ingersoll was a United Empire Loyalist (uncited, of course). It's a belief held by (or assumed) a certain number of Canadians, and I think it's important to disabuse readers of that notion. Curly Turkey (gobble) 23:10, 19 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sure, I'm fine with those changes. - Dank (push to talk) 01:04, 20 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would make "(where she stopped at the home of her half-brother Charles, who was ill in bed)" a note; I think it's a bit tangential and interrupts the flow of that sentence. - Dank (push to talk) 00:18, 21 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The two instances of " are said to " in the personal description section leave me a little skeptical ... who said? - Dank (push to talk) 00:28, 21 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support on prose per standard disclaimer. These are my edits. - Dank (push to talk) 01:10, 21 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Review by Nikkimaria

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Sources and images - spotchecks not done. Disclaimer: have previously edited the article

Review by Paul MacDermott

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  • Support I have reviewed this article using text-to-speech software, so please note there are aspects of it I haven't checked, such as images, but those seem to have been covered by other reviewers. Having listened to it several times over the last few days I find it reads well and provides a broad coverage of the topic. I like articles where I come away having learnt something interesting, and as someone from the UK I was unaware of Laura Secord and the role she played in history. One suggestion I have (though this is optional) is adding the pronunciation of her surname. My software pronounces it as "Seecord", but I've no idea if that is correct. Paul MacDermott (talk) (disclaimer) 12:32, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'd actually wanted to include a pronunciation, but have been unable to find a reliable source that provides one. Growing up in Canada, everyone around me pronounced Laura Secord Chocolates as /ˈsikɔɹd/; when I took my family to the Laura Secord Homestead last summer, the staff pronounced her name that way as well. The Japanese wiki site for her (jp:ローラ・セコール) has her name pronounced in a pseudo-French style (/sekoːɽɯ/), which made me doubt which was correct (I live in Japan, and looked it up for my wife). There are Japanese sources that give a pronunciation similar to the one I grew up with, though. There's a Yahoo! Answers page, which I'm fairly certain is a prank, that pronounces it /ˈlauɹə ˈsɛkɔɹd/. Curly Turkey (gobble) 21:41, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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