Talk:List of National Historic Landmarks in Tennessee

development of descriptions and articles

Some of the descriptions are more developed than the articles for the NHL sites that they describe! Especially for the several cases where there is no article yet.... Editing help in the articles is needed... doncram (talk) 04:52, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Update: a separate article for each of the NHL sites was eventually created, justifying a Start rating for this list-article from wp:NRHP.

As part of a wp:NRHP article cleanup drive ending July 4, 2008, the following edit needs were identified for Tennessee sites (in a June/July review within wp:NHL progress by Lvklock:

• Franklin Battlefield should be split out of the battle article; Done
• George Peabody College for Teachers needs NHL summary reference (and NRHP docs ref)  Done
• Graceland (Home of Elvis Presley) needs NHL summary reference (and NRHP docs ref) Done
• The Hermitage needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)  Done
• Old First Presbyterian Church needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• Rhea County Courthouse needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• Ryman Auditorium, needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• Tennessee State Capitol needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• X-10 Graphite Reactor needs NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• Pinson Mounds needs NHL designation date in infobox and NHL summary reference (and NHRP docs ref)
• Sycamore Shoals needs NHL designation date (and NHRP docs ref)

• NRHP text/photo refs verified added through #4, Fort Loudon.

As of October 2008, those improvements are all still needed, or at least they have not been checked off in the wp:NRHP's master checklist for NHL article improvements (checklist located at wp:NHL progress and transcluded into the wp:NRHP main page). doncram (talk) 12:28, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

(Broke out the review into a checklist above, which can become the working version now.) All of the NHL articles should also be checked for whether they include NRHP inventory/nomination text and photo PDF references that are available online for almost all NHLs. Those lacking NHL summary reference probably lack that as well. Adding these NRHP documents was not part of the July 4 NHL cleanup drive but having the documents referenced is basic to understanding and documenting what exactly is covered in a NHL designation. doncram (talk) 16:44, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I haven't been doing much lately, maybe some rote stuff like adding references will be just the thing! I'll try to work on it some soon. Lvklock (talk) 17:09, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Bold-Revert-Discuss, and context

I added a draft section on non-NHL historic sites in TN to help to provide context on what the NHLs are and are not. Orlady boldly changed that, I reverted, and now let's discuss please. I think that providing some context on what the NHLs are is helpful. Other comments? doncram (talk) 13:19, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

[Sorry for taking so long to reply here; I've been feeling distracted by things like a mushrooming sockpuppetry case.] Your perspective on your addition is interesting, because it is radically different from mine. My perspective was that you had altered the scope of this list article, transforming it from (1) a list with a clearly defined scope (National Historic Landmarks in Tennessee) and comprehensive coverage of that scope to (2) an ill-defined and open-ended conglomeration, titled "National Historic Landmarks" but including a varied collection of sites and properties in Tennessee that someone or other has called "historic" at one time or another. I see this (here and in the New York NHL list) as a giant step backwards.
Some background on where I'm coming from.... Lists seem to have become one of my focuses at Wikipedia. My efforts with lists have included both rescue (from AfD) and ongoing maintenance of some problematic lists that will never qualify for FL status, but that for some reason or other I think have value (for example, List of unaccredited institutions of higher learning, List of unrecognized accreditation associations of higher learning, List of city nicknames in the United States, List of colleges and universities named after people, and List of bow tie wearers) and active participation in the creation of featured lists (for example, List of cities and towns in Tennessee) and review of featured list candidates. I'm very aware that list-making is necessary, controversial (some Wikipedians seem to dislike all lists), and poses particular challenges, so I want to see featured lists that can serve as exemplars for other Wikipedians. Probably because it's easiest to make a good list when the list scope is well-defined and closed-ended, there is a single authoritative source for the list content (or just a few sources), the topics of the vast majority of featured lists are ephemera such as discographies and rosters of professional sports teams. Not only do I have some knowledge of and interest in NHLs and the National Register, but I perceive lists of NHLs as one interesting and important non-ephemeral topic that easily lends itself to creation of featured lists. With that background, I am frustrated to see the clear closed-ended scope of these articles muddied by your desire to include a variety of related topics. That approach ensures that these will never become FLs.
Rather than expanding the scope of these lists to include national historic parks, national heritage areas, state historic sites, non-NHL NRHP listings -- and in the process probably also inadvertently inviting inclusion of every flea-bitten local history museum that has ever been blessed by proclamation of a state legislature, let's use the article introduction to explain the specific meaning of NHLs and how they relate to other types of historic designations, but let's resist the temptation to list all those other types of properties in these articles. Keep the focus on National Historic Landmarks. --Orlady (talk) 23:29, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

This isn't a full response, but where i am coming from, is mostly from having helped build out 54 lists of NHLs, starting in July 2007 when i got involved in wikipedia with the NYS list as a very incomplete list of names of sites, with few articles, no pictures, no descriptions. The list of NPS areas was already done and the then-incomplete list of NHLs was just being cut up into state sublists. It seemed to me that NHLs were the next most important group out of the NRHPs to work on, and since then working on the NHL lists is what i have done most of. I myself started, i figure, about 1000-1200 of the 2,443 articles now in place covering all of the NHLs, and i've edited a higher proportion, usually adding references and links. I was majorly involved in the development of the tables implemented in all the NHL lists and now in many NRHP lists.

At the moment I am building out the list of Tennessee state historic sites just to see what they are, have found articles and/or started stub articles for 8 of 14 now. I expect this should be edited down, here. Probably it will be clear that they are less important and the list of them should not remain in this article. Constructing out the list might help in constructing a summary statement or two about them though. I didn't anything about them at all beforehand, am learning and forming an opinion by this process. It shouldn't be a problem to just mention them briefly in the List of NHLs article, like describing the non-NHL 1000 or so NRHP sites in the state. The NHLs look more important than either of those groups. doncram (talk) 05:54, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

The issue is not one of the importance of the items in the list, but rather a simple issue of the scope of the list article. This is a list of National Historic Landmarks in Tennessee, so it should not be expanded to include national parks in the state that have historic value (regardless of their importance) unless they are also designated NHLs, non-landmark-class NRHP properties, state managed historic sites and living history museums, or anything else that's not a current or former National Historic Landmark. Note that a well-defined scope is one of the core concepts underlying Wikipedia:Featured list criteria. --Orlady (talk) 14:11, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I hear you, of course. I think it would be premature to prohibit any mention of any other historic sites in the state, however. For example, discussing the NPS areas, which it turns out are all older than the NHLs from this listing process, may provide perspective on the NHLs. For example, comparing the number of NRHPs in the state to the number of NHLs, may provide perspective on the NHLs. Let it be for a little while. As i said, I am just browsing about the state historic sites now. doncram (talk) 15:10, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Hmm... Compiling the numbers is very appropriate, but I fear that comparing the numbers of NHLs in a state with the number of NRHPs, or comparing the numbers of NHLs between states and between counties, verges on original research, as comparison implies that you expect to draw conclusions from the comparison. Furthermore, consider that differences may not signify much. For example, between jurisdictions often are due more to the presence of people who are interested in historic designation (and have the resources to pursue it) than to the presence or absence of potentially eligible properties. The willingness of property owners to cooperate with designation is also a major factor. --Orlady (talk) 19:08, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe Orlady said not to mention the others, just not to list them. I can see the value of compiling the list in order to be better able to see the contrasts between the types, so that they can be mentioned in the intro. I am torn on inclusion of the lists of other types in the final version. From an editor's standpoint, I absolutely see the virtue of limiting it to the core, very well-defined list. It does get messy to include the other small classifications. Obviously it brings up these questions, which will clearly compromise the chances of making FL. From a user standpoint, I do like having the info all in one place when I'm traveling and want to see what there is to see. Lvklock (talk) 15:37, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I can relate to the value of having all the info in one place, but we all need to remember that Wikipedia is not a travel guide. Even if it were, I submit that NHL articles would not be the appropriate place to consolidate information about visitable historic sites. The professional historians with whom I've discussed NHL designations are not primarily interested in visitability, but rather in the landmark qualities of the property (see this list of the official criteria for designation).
Call me an old fuddy-duddy, but I have an old-fashioned notion that encyclopedia articles about the NHL program should tell about the NHL program, not historic sites in general, historic tourism attractions, or other related topics. Explain the focus of the program and provide crosslinks to other articles that tell about related topics, but don't try to put all of the related content into a single article. --Orlady (talk) 19:08, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

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