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Alexander Cameron Rutherford

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This peer review discussion has been closed.
This recently became a good article, and I think it's close to FA quality. However, I wanted to get a few more opinions before I brought it to WP:FAC. Cheers, Sarcasticidealist (talk) 22:41, 23 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]


Thanks for your review (so far)! For clarity's sake, my responses will be in italics. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 00:41, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments:

I know very little about Canadian politics, and absolutely nothing about Canadian provincial politics, so this is new territory for me, and most interesting, too. I will confine my comments for the moment to the lead and first few sections, with more to follow:-

  • Lead
    • "articled" in the professional training sense is a pretty obsolete word, and needs to be linked, via a pipe, to articled clerk.
    • I have never met "articled" as a verb before. Is this standard North American usage? In UK we would have said "was articled"
      • In Canada, everybody describes it as "articling", as I've written in the article. However, that appears to be more colloquial than I'd realized, so I'll change it.
    • Overdetailing: informative though it is, I think the lead is too long. It has a lot of detail, rather than the summary sweep which should characterise a lead. For example, I would reduce the first paragraph to something like this:-

Alexander Cameron Rutherford (February 2, 1857–June 11, 1941) was a Canadian lawyer and politician who served as the first Premier of Alberta from 1905 to 1910. Born in Ormond, Ontario, he studied and practised law in law Ottawa before moving with his family to the Northwest Territories in 1895. Here he began his political career, winning at the third attempt a seat in the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories. In keeping with the local custom Rutherford ran as an independent, though he generally supported the territorial administration of Premier Frederick W. A. G. Haultain. At the federal level, however, Rutherford was a Liberal.

This is offered as an indication of the level of detail I would expect to find in the lead, not necessarily as the wording you should use. Similar contractions could be made in the other paragraphs.

  • Early life
    • "two years previous"? Does this mean "two years previously"? (is it NorthAm usage again?)
  • Move west
    • "...to investigate the disappearance of a cousin" is intriguing, but cryptic. Is a brief explanation possible?
      • Sadly, I haven't found a source that expands more than that on it. I debated leaving it out for that reason, but it seemed too interesting a detail not to include.
    • "The Rocky Mountains and the west coast Chinese immigrants left a great impression on him, as did the coastal climate which he found "very agreeable". A number of issues with this sentence.
      • The phrasing seems oddly sequenced; there seems no reason to link the Rocky Mountains and the Chinese immigrants, with the coastal climate as the afterthought. It might be more logical to have the Rocky Mountains and the coastal climate together, and the immigrants as the afterthought.
      • Or, since the Chinese immigrants are not mentioned again in the article (so far as I can see), need they be mentioned here?
      • The phrase "very agreeable" is an everyday expression, which doesn't need to be in quote marks.
        • It's a direct quote from Rutherford's description of his trip.
    • Need to be consistent about where he moved to when he went west. In the lead it says Strathcona, here it says South Edmonton. It seems these are different names for the same place, but there needs to be more clarity.
      • They are indeed the same place; I just assumed the Strathcona, Alberta article would have covered that, but it appears not to. I'll modify either that article or this one to make it clearer.
        • Actually, rereading the article, it includes "He was an early advocate for the incorporation of South Edmonton, hitherto an unincorporated community, and when incorporation came in 1899—as the Town of Strathcona..." - is that not sufficiently clear?
    • It would read better to say he defended a native American rather than a "native"
    • "...at a time when most lawyers wouldn't" is not very encyclopedic. Suggest "at a time when most lawyers refused such cases".
    • General: as with the lead I think there is too much small detail. Things which don't really add anything include "with a car load of furnishings", "a four-room house built on a single storey", the lengthy list of his local offices, and POV-ish statements like "Rutherford fast became a pillar of the community".
  • Early political career
    • "and advocated for..." The "for" is unnecessary – "advocated" means argued for.
    • "Also" is unnecessary in "Rutherford also criticised..."
      • Overuse of "also" is a pet peeve of mine; I am sore abashed.
    • The following sentence goes on and on and on..."It at first looked as though he would run unopposed..." – ending 64 words later. This needs splitting, perhaps into three sentences?
    • "prevented the Northwest Territories from meeting their obligations." Some indication of what these obligations were would be helpful.
    • Check linking of Northwest Territories. This should be at first mention.

I will return as soon as I can. Meantime you may wish to consider the above suggestion. Brianboulton (talk) 23:28, 29 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Next bite

  • Selection as premier
    • Laurier should be referred to as the federal PM
    • Certain names that occur should have forenames added at first mention - it is not always immediately possible to remember them by just the surname. Thus, Frank Oliver, Peter Talbot, George Bulyea.
      • I wonder if you happen to know if there's an MOS rule about this (I'm not so hot with the MOS). My natural inclination is to provide first names the first time a person is mentioned in each section, on the assumption that a lot of readers do what I do and read articles section-by-section rather than starting at the beginning. However, I know that we're not supposed to do that with wikilinks (which would also be my inclination), so I thought the same might apply with first names.
    • "wasn't" and "didn't" are too informal
    • "...announced that he would stay in Regina." For the benefit of us outsiders, what does this mean?
    • "Bulyeaasked Alexandr Rutherford..." no need to include the "Alexander".

(OK, only a bit, but progress all the same) Brianboulton (talk) 23:16, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Continuing

  • 1905 election
    • "to which to propose legislation" is correct, but inelegant. How about: "to which he could propose legislation"?
    • "...Bennett. Bennett..." is avoidable by slight rewording: "...had already selected R.B. Bennett as their leader. Bennett..."
    • "especially egregious". Not sure: "egregious" means "outstandingly awful" – can you be "especially outstandingly awful"? I love the word, but it may not be the right choice here.
    • The sentence beginning "Bennett attached..." is another rambler, even longer than the one I highlighted earlier. It needs to be split.
    • – and the following sentence is longer still!
    • Numbers of seats won or predicted should be numeric (apart from the two), thus 18, 25, 21, 23. I'd suggest a slight rewording: "Immediately after the election it appeared that the Liberals had won 21; when all the votes had been counted they had won 23 seats to the Conservatives' two."
  • First legislation etc
    • I think "most enthusiastically" is POV
    • I'd suggest: "...motions to select each of these..." (of these added)
    • "Legislation...passed the legislature." Again, correct but awkward-sounding, seems repetitious. What about: "A bill establishing the University was passed by the legislature, but left the Government to decide the location"?
    • "Perhaps most significantly..." Who says "most significantly"?
    • 140 – number starting sentence. This is one of those wikipedia no-nos that I've never really understood. To write out "One hundred and forty" would be absurd, but you could rephrase: "In the first year of Alberta's existence [as a province], 140 new schools..." etc
    • "normal school" should be briefly explained, beyond the link
    • Image of Rutherford as Premier. If his dates are to be believed, he was between 48 and 53 when this picture was taken. He looks much, much older – maybe 75, maybe 80. Are we sure of the photograph's date?
      • The source from which it was taken (the Babcock biography) gives the date as between 1905 and 1910. Besides that, in my view he looks about the same age as he does in this image, which i. includes a precise date (which gives more confidence in its accuracy) and ii. includes a photograph of a man who died in 1912. Besides that, here's a photograph of Rutherford at 81; I think there's definitely at least a couple decades' difference between that photo and the one in the article.

More to follow Brianboulton (talk)

  • Labour unrest
    • "The winter of 1906–07" would be more usual (otherwise it sounds like two winters)
    • "called" a commission? "appointed", perhaps?
    • "it came together" → "it met"
    • In the sentence beginning "Its recommendations included that..." the grammar is not quite right. Suggest amend to "Its recommendations included the prohibition of children under 16 working in mines..." etc. (Note: 16 should be numeric)
  • Public works
    • "This did not stop them..." sounds a bit informal, possibly
    • "shouldn't" and (later) "didn't" are definitely informal
    • 37 and 41 should be numerics
    • The first sentence of para 3 reads POV. In the following sentence I wonder if "a kind of mania" is an expression used by the source. If so, it should be in quotes; if not, it shouldn't be used at all.

Comments on remaining sections will have to be brief:-

  • Railway scandal: Scandal? does this affair really warrant being called a "scandal" – it seems fairly tame to me. Up to you, but it could perhaps be downgraded to "controversy". Also, you say "and looked as if it would continue to do so." To do what?
  • Later political career: The opening sentence ("The 1913 election was not the first time..." etc) sounds very journalistic, with its hints of revelations to come. I wonder if the sentence is necessary at all? And, as we jump back to 1911, it should be: "...several local Liberals...had asked..." rather than just "asked"
  • Professional career: I found this section a bit over-detailed, especially in the first paragraph
  • University of Alberta: clarify that Aberhart was the provincial PM. Also, you should briefly state what authority was removed from the senate, and to whom it was given.
  • Community involvement: I don't know what the existing record is for the longest sentence in a wikipedia article, but your entry is clearly the sentence which begins: "He was a deacon..." and ends, approx. 140 words later, with "...Canadian Authors Association". I'm almost tempted to say you should keep it, for record-breaking purposes, but perhaps you had better split it up.

This concludes my review. I have found the article interesting, and it has taught me something about early 20th century provincial Canadian politics, not an area I have encountered much before. A little too much detail in places, perhaps: a sometime tendency to veer away from encyclopedic language and use journalistic forms; overuse of parenthetical information which disrupts the prose flow. Also see my detailed comments which are mainly nitpicks. The article looks a natural for FAC after a little work, and I look forward to seeing it there.

Peer review is short of reviewers. It will help to keep this key stage in article development going if you are able to review an article from the PR backlog – see WP:PR#backlog

Brianboulton (talk) 14:27, 1 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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