Talk:Adolph Douai

Texas

Start/Low Bhaktivinode 17:41, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Note to relatives

In the off chance that a relative of Adolph Douai happens to find this page, please do not hesitate to write if you happen to have additional information, family photos, etc. which can be put into the public domain. Thanks! — Tim Davenport, Early American Marxism website, Corvallis, OR MutantPop@aol.com Carrite (talk) 04:57, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Concerns

I have concerns about how this has been re-written. For comparison of style, have a look at Karl Marx. The current version of this Douai article has a tone and style that violates Wikipedia's NPV, and makes statements that are not backed up by inline citations. You need more than the one source, and preferably something that can be accessed by any user. i.e. - the claim is made that in some vague period between 1876 and 1878, Douai wrote ten textbooks - cite the books and give publishing details. The statement is made that his editorial opinions about abolishing slavery resulted, "...in widespread public antipathy which lead to the rapid demise of his publication..." - back that up with verifiable resources. Overall, this could be written just stating the verifiable facts, without the tone of Douai vs Whoever. The Karl Marx article is a good reference on documentation. Maile66 (talk) 14:07, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Second source added, passage about "widespread public antipathy" modified. WorldCat can't confirm 10 books and that change will be made. Autobiography from which this is drawn will be published and accessible to the world later today. Carrite (talk) 15:05, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

What autobiography are you referencing? Are you suggesting that you're using information from a source that hasn't even been published yet? I confess I don't see how this is possible, unless you're its editor. — e. ripley\^talk 15:53, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Autobiography is included in Douai's obituary, now (re-)published into the non-commercial public domain and linked in the footnotes. Carrite (talk) 17:07, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

BTW the sourcing possibilities for articles on Karl Marx and Adolph Douai are not remotely comparable, of course. Carrite (talk) 15:12, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

It isn't the volumnous amount of sources cited on Karl Marx that is the point. It's that there are multiple sources of various types. Your need secondary and third-party resources. People can write anything - but how do you know they got it correct? How do you know the primary source didn't just make it up? I've found numerous factual errors within popular sources. Often, I find that sources copy verbatim from the easiest place, without bothering to verify. It takes a lot of work - I've started to add sources to a page, thinking at the onset I'd find nothing, and I end up with a decent amount of resources. You might want to research in Google Books - great research tool - when you find what you need there, you can get isbn numbers in Amazon. The following Wikipedia templates might also be of use to you when writing up the citations: Template:Cite journal, Template:Cite news, Template:Cite book

--Maile66 (talk) 18:19, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

western Texas - this is a good point on sourcing. Depends on what is meant by west Texas. Most of what is considered west Texas was not settled until after the Civil War and after the Emancipation Proclamation.

--Maile66 (talk) 18:40, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

A published obit containing the autobiography of the deceased is a high level, quality source. Note as well that this very article was one of the sources consulted by Sibley for her piece published by the Texas Historical Society, cited in the footnotes. Note also that she gets the date wrong by a year in citing this article — one worships the accuracy of secondary sources at their own peril. It is one of the great tragedies of Wikipedia that it was set up by philosophy buffs rather than historians...

There's a biography of Douai and a monograph on the '48ers, cited in further reading, which would provide a big sledgehammer for crushing any factual mistakes which may have trickled into the biography as it sits. Anyone interested in taking this thing from roughly C level to B level or better is invited to peruse them. I don't own either book, or else I would. Google Books isn't satisfactory for this purpose, since it provides only a page here and a page there, which may be useful for a drive-by, but not for a serious review of the contents of a given book. Carrite (talk) 19:43, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Weighing here on the Douai conversation as an amateur researcher who has been researching Douai for some time. First of all, the Douai autobiography HAS NOT been published. There is a typsescript copy of the auto bio in the Douai File at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas in Austin, and apparently also a copy at the San Antonio Public Library. The autobio is an English translation by Douai's grandson from Douai's original German notebooks. Getting the autobiography published is a current project which I hope to accomplish. Second, in regards to "West Texas", the term should be viewed in its historical context. From the years of Texas statehood to roughly right after the Civil War (the Douai and 48er "era") "West Texas" primarily referred to the (German)settlements in the Hill Country counties of Gillespies, Kendall, Blanco, Llano and others, all east of the Texas geographical divide. There was a feeble attempt by Douai and Frederick Olmstead to set up a free state of West Texas prior to the Civil war (Douai autobiograhy), along the lines of a Kansas, but this effort did not come to fruition. After the Civil War, there was an effort by the same German elements to set up a separate state of West Texas, which also did not go past the Reconstruction Legislature.("Constitution of the State of West Texas" pamphlet). Third, some of Douai's books may not have been more than thick pamphlets, and he also authored at least two novels. I am not sure of an exact number of total publications. Fourth, the documentation about Douai newspaper in San Antonio being attacked by angry secessionist mob is verifiable in many sources, most notably the citation in the Handbook of Texas. blacktexasredBlacktexasred (talk) 18:47, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

NPOV challenge

Per Wikipedia policy, please state specific examples of alleged POV writing so that they may be addressed. Thank you. Carrite (talk) 15:14, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

It has been over a week and I've invited the flagger for specifics per standard WP practice without reply. I earnestly believe NPOV concerns have been rectified and am pulling the flag. Carrite (talk) 03:04, 3 June 2010 (UTC)