Wikipedia:Peer review/John Brownlee as Attorney-General of Alberta/archive1

John Brownlee as Attorney-General of Alberta

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I'd like to send this over to WP:FAC at some point in the not-too-distant future. I know that it's far too reliant on a single source (Franklin Foster's biography of Brownlee) at the moment, and I intend to do what I can to fix that before nominating it. The reality is, though, that Foster has covered this subject in far greater depth than any other academic, and the substance of the article is unlikely to change substantially as I incorporate other sources. Accordingly, I would like thoughts on how this article measures up to the featured article criteria (along with any other suggestions for improvement). Steve Smith (talk) 05:31, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Finetooth comments: This is professionally written, interesting, and may be comprehensive (though I'm not the best judge of that). I enjoyed it, and I am becoming less of an ignoramus about Alberta each time I read one of your fascinating articles. The single-source dependency looks like a problem, but you doubtless have a solution in mind. The image licenses in four cases might need some tweaking, as noted below. My other comments are about minor prose and style issues. Nice job.

Lead

"he also became the government's de facto leader" - Italics for de facto"?

Entry into cabinet and the legislature

Maybe delete "the" in the head so that it reads, "Entry into cabinet and legislature"?

"Brownlee demurred, reluctant to take the resulting cut in income, not eager to leave his family in Calgary to work in Edmonton... ". - Maybe wikilink Edmonton and add, "the provincial capital" for foreigners who might not know it.

"Percival Baker, the UFA member elected for Ponoka, had died election day from injuries sustained earlier... ". - Maybe "had died on election day"?

"a more reasonable candidate for that rugged northern riding" - Wikilink riding? Also, although I find the phrase poetic, in what sense(s) was (is) the riding rugged? The word might mean geographically rugged, or it might mean politically or socially rugged.

Advisor to the government

"Brownlee had the greatest debating experience of the UFA members... ". - Maybe "most" or "broadest" or "widest" instead of "greatest" because the latter might be misunderstood at first to mean "most enjoyable"?

The Manual of Style suggests using blockquotes for quotes of four lines or more. This one fills only two lines on my computer screen. I'd probably just use an ordinary quote embedded in the text.

Railways and natural resources

"These expenditures were the result of syndicates responsible for four small railroads collapsing, leaving the government supporting their construction." - Tighten? Suggestion: "These expenditures resulted from the collapse of four small-railroad syndicates, which left the government to finance the rail construction."

"Alberta sought control over the resources, both because it believed that this would yield higher revenues than the grant did and out of sheer pride." - Tighten by one word by deleting "did"? Or maybe recast as "Alberta sought control over the resources not only because it believed that this would yield higher revenues than the grant, but out of sheer pride."

Images

File:Herbert Greenfield 1921.jpg should be moved so that it fits entirely within a single section and does not overlap two sections.
File:JohnEBrownlee.jpg is licensed as PD in Canada and in the U.S. The other four images are licensed PD in Canada. Are they also PD in the U.S.? If so, do the license pages need to be updated to include this information?

Hope this helps. If so, please consider reviewing another article from the backlog at WP:PR. Finetooth (talk) 03:42, 23 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the review! My girlfriend was looking over my shoulder as I was reading it, and commented "he's a good reviewer"; I assured her that your username was indeed apt. I've made all the changes that you recommended except for italicizing "de facto" (when I've italicized it previously, reviewers have objected on the basis that it is now an English phrase taken from Latin, rather than a Latin phrase used in English) and specifying rugged (all uses apply: rocky, heavily forested terrain, men being men and sheep being nervous, etc.). Steve Smith (talk) 22:49, 28 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like Wyoming. Finetooth (talk) 01:21, 29 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]