Talk:List of Alpha Phi Omega members/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Frank Braden?

"Frank W. Braden – ? – Assistant National Director BSA for Senior Scouting (and other positions), responsible for establishing Wood Badge in the United States" Responsible for establishing WB in the US? Says who? I've never heard of him in any of my readings about WB history in the US. ---Emb021

See Ref added to page. Naraht 13:43, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

How do we know he's an Honorary Member, if the article doesn't say which Chapter, Section, Region, or National honored him?

Also true of several others. This should be found out, or these people should be deleted. Lentower 15:04, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

The reason that we know is that issues of the Torch and Trefoil have refered to them as Honorary members of the Fraternity. I think if the T&T says something like

"Frank Braden, Assistant National Director of BSA and honorary brother will be the keynote speaker on the second day of the 1938 convention."

that we can continue to include them. We *do* know they are honorary brothers, we just don't know of which chapter (or NHM) they are a member of. I will go back and research the issue that I got the information from, but chapter may not be there. Naraht 19:38, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Please add the footnote!

Then you should do a full ref/cite for each of these Torch & Trefoil lookups!

You go to all the trouble of researching the old T&Ts, and you don't include the citations?!?!?!?

This is Wikipedia, you're suppose to cite your references.

For example, expand

* Frank W. Braden – ?{{cn}} – Assistant National 
Director BSA for Senior Scouting (and other positions), 
responsible for establishing [[Wood Badge]] in the United States.<ref>{{cite web 
|url= http://www.scouting.milestones.btinternet.co.uk/woodbadge.htm
|title= The origins of the Wood Badge
|accessdate=2006-12-04 
|format= HTML
|work= Scouting Milestones
}}</ref>

to something like (needs XXXXXs replaced and testing - delete any "|" line that you can't fill - see Template:Cite journal and Help:Footnotes for details):

* Frank W. Braden – ?<ref name="TandTBraden">{{cite journal
|last= XXXXX
|first= XXXXX
|authorlink= XXXXX
|coauthors= XXXXX
|year= XXXXX
|month= XXXXX
|title= XXXXX
|journal= Torch and Trefoil
|volume= XXXXX
|issue= XXXXX
|pages= XXXXX
|id= XXXXX
|url= http://www.apo.org/show/Publications_and_Forms/Torch_and_Trefoil
|accessdate= 2004-12-XXXX
}} Torch and Trefoil does not say what part of APO conferred Braden's 
honorary membership.</ref> – Assistant National Director BSA 
for Senior Scouting (and other positions), responsible for establishing 
[[Wood Badge]] in the United States.<ref name="TandTBraden"/><ref>{{cite web 
|url= http://www.scouting.milestones.btinternet.co.uk/woodbadge.htm
|title= The origins of the Wood Badge
|accessdate=2006-12-04 
|format= HTML
|work= Scouting Milestones
}}</ref>

Note that:

• ISSN's are modern (the "id=" field). I just looked at a recent T&T for it -- no ISSN. I'll talk to the National Office about getting one!
• if the "|last= XXXXX |first= XXXXX |authorlink= XXXXX |coauthors= XXXXX", you substitute them with either "|author= Alpha Phi Omega" or "|author= LAST, FIRST, editor"

Thanks! Lentower 03:49, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Need citations that show APO connection, etc.

Each of these brothers need a citation that show the APO connection, and how we know what Chapter they are in, and/or what part of APO conferred Honorary membership. This might belong after the Chapter name, or body conferring Honorary membership, instead of the end of each item. Lentower 04:05, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Non-notables?

Does anyone have objections to either any specific members mentioned or categories of those mentioned? The ones that actually seem shakiest to me are a few of the business related ones that come directly from the APO National Web pages. Naraht 14:04, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Any in particular to mention? The ones I'm thinking of just looking at it might be:

Warren Brown; just an automobile columnist for the Washington Post? An editor is probably notable, but a columnist? How is he famous?

Howard Gossage; just says he's an ad executive from the 50s and 60s. What company? How is this notable?

There's also several BSA members on the list. But how low on the totem pole over there are we going to go? Certainly, John Schiff, a former National President of the BSA is notable, as well as past Chief Scout Executives (James Tarr, James West). But what about someone like James Fitch, a region scout executive (I guess that somewhat like an APO Region Director?). What else did he do to merit being on this list? Or is that it? Or what about Harry Pote (past BSA Director of Personnel?). Is this notable enough? Dr. Cash 00:53, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Warren Brown has been a columnist at the Post for the last 30 years and has covered the automobile industry for the last 24. See [1]

Howard Gossage is one of Ad Age's top 100 of the century (20th) [2]

As for the BSA members, I actually dropped several Regional Scout Executives that I found, I included James Fitch for two reasons: One, the amount of time he was an RSE (25 years) and two, he has a Wikipedia Page. I included anyone who was a National Director of XXXX for the BSA. I thought that a national level officer for a national organization was notable enough. Naraht 13:10, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Formby and Fleming?

Why the deletion of the references for Formby and Fleming? In both cases I added a reference to their pages at the Mississippi legislature... Naraht 18:47, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I deleted those references because the URLs resulted in 404 not found for both of them. Dr. Cash 23:11, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

You are right... I'll get back to you when the Mississippi Legislative website comes back up. *wierd* Naraht 02:05, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

T&T's but not Lightbearers?

I noticed that the reference entries for the T&Ts got Linkified, but the ones for the Lightbearer did not. The Lighbearers are the predecessors of the T&Ts and in fact the volume #s did not restart when they changed the name (note that these are different than the Daily Lightbearers at the National Conventions. Should they be changed over as well?

Look again. Dr. Cash 17:30, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

An an additional note, it would be nice if we had a title (and an author, if possible) for those T&T and Lighbearer articles. Although the information provided currently is enough for someone to find the information if they were looking for it. Dr. Cash 17:32, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

OK, thanx. I'll try to find titles and authors if I can. Also, do you have any feeling as mentioned above on [[Georgetown University|Mu Alpha]] for the chapters here? Naraht 17:47, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

William J. Campbell

I've reverted the re-adding back of the answers.com reference for Campbell. I see that the correct one is mentioned on the page, however, I don't think that answers.com is exactly a repudable source on this, and there are two other references for him anyway. Answers.com mainly looks (a) heavily commercial and (b) largely copied from mirror information from wikipedia anyway; so if (b), can't we just find a wikipedia article on him and go with that? But my general feelings on answers.com is that there's too much spam and commercial advertising links on their pages, so I put their credibility in doubt,... Dr. Cash 20:28, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

It isn't a copy from Wikipedia, it is a copy from http://law.enotes.com/wests-law-encyclopedia/campbell-william-joseph that they apparently got complete access to at one point. And I count West's Law encyclopedia as a decent source. Naraht 13:48, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Citations for Chapter Membership.

Citations for chapter membership for those with Wikipedia Entries seems problematic. As an example, Bill Clinton. He attended Georgetown University as an undergraduate. What is required as a source? Simply a web page that says that Mu Alpha is at Georgetown or one that specifically says he joined Alpha Phi Omega there or something that says he specifically says he joined Mu Alpha there? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Naraht (talk • contribs) 14:23, 6 December 2006 (UTC).

Info on WP is suppose to be verifable. You claim X is a brother of Y chapter, you are suppose to provide a citation that verifies that. Lentower 22:42, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think we're going to find the specific chapter greek letter designations in mainstream media sources. For example, this article on Robert Gates, only says he was in Alpha Phi Omega at W&M, but doesn't mention specifically Nu Rho Chapter. The only publication that is even possibly going to have a greek letter designation for the chapter is the T&T, and I somehow doubt that every person on this list is going to be mentioned in the T&T. For this purpose, we might consider changing the greek letter designation next to each individual to the school name. This would be easier to verify. But just verifying that brother X is a member of chapter Y isn't everything. The reference should also provide some basis of why brother X is a notable member of APO. Dr. Cash 22:54, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Unless someone objects, I think what I proposed a while ago is the best answer. Instead of Mu Alpha, use [[Georgetown University|Mu Alpha]], that both shows what it is and makes the reference only need to apply to linking the person to Alpha Phi Omega @ Georgetown. If necessary, a single reference could be to the page on the National website with all of the chapter IDs on it. Naraht 12:58, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Good idea. This has now been done. Dr. Cash 21:09, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Any idea where to link the National Honorary Membership to? Naraht 13:49, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

I have no idea. I just left it blank for now. I suppose we could link it to the main APO article, or specifically to a subsection in there regarding national honorary membership, but I'm not sure if that's really necessary anyway. Does the national fraternity even award 'national honorary membership' anymore, anyway? Dr. Cash 18:28, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

(Reset) Yup, at least it still can.

5) HONORARY MEMBERSHIP. Honorary Membership may be conferred by any collegiate Chapter, Petitioning Group upon charter approval, or the National Board of Directors, upon persons who have contributed significantly to the ideals and purposes of Alpha Phi Omega. Naraht 21:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Minor editing point - no space before <ref>s

Please add no space before <ref>s per Wikipedia:Footnotes#Where_to_place_ref_tags. Lentower 19:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

There are still more of these spaces to remove, if anyone get to them before I do. Lentower 19:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. A minor little nitpick,... but alas, it is proper formatting,... ;-) Dr. Cash 20:44, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

72.244.26.2

Those additions were by naraht, I'm not sure why it stopped being logged in. Naraht 17:10, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Use {{cite X...}} templates?

I like to propose that we use {{cite X...}} templates inside <ref>...</refs>.

Why?

• They will give a consistent format and style to the references. Both inside the article, and with all the other articles that use them. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

But said format is completely inconsistent with reference formats used by paper-based publications!! Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

So WP has it's own style. Many organizations do. And there are many different reference formats used in different paper-based publications. Usually one style for journals within a profession. Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

• They give the reader more info then just a URL. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree. This is a good idea. But, IMHO, can be done much better and much easier w/o a template. Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Without templates, holding the style and format consistent with even one editor is a chore. With multiple editors it's very hard.Lentower 01:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

• The editor doesn't have to add all the punctation, etc. - the template does it for you. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Except that the punctuation the template adds is completely incorrect with respect to established reference styles!!!! Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

So WP has it's own style. Many organizations do. Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

• They remind the editor of all the data that the citation should have. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Only IF the editor remembers all of the variables,... Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

If you cut-n-paste the template, you have all the fields right there! Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

• It's easy to cut-n-paste a blank template from each template's page (see below) or the {{cite X...}} templates summary. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Umm, not really. Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

It's quite simple (guess we disagree about cut-n-paste between browser windows). I have the summary page open in my browser, whenever I'm WP editing. Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

This might work for times when you're quite busy actively editing and writing a page. But a lot of times, I find that you go in to edit something small in wikipedia, need to cite your source, and it's a bit too cumbersome to open up the template page to cut-and-paste to and mess with that. Now, if some sort of little widget could be scripted to automatically format the reference using the template, I could see how that could be useful. Dr. Cash 00:02, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

A widget that worked in all browsers would be nice. You could come back and clean it up later, when you are into a full edit session. When I'm doing a small edit away from my usual environment, I just click Editing help below the edit pane into a new browser tab or window, and click three pages, and I can do the cut-n-paste. It's automatic for me now - but I've been a power computer users for four decades and quickly build up a set of shorcuts in new computing environments like WP. There are those who won't want to learn the WP article link network that well. Lentower 01:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

• They are increasingly being use throughout en.wikipedia.org. Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

I would disagree with you here. A lot of editors really dislike them,... Dr. Cash 21:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

And a lot of editors like them. ;-} Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Ok, so it's probably about 50/50 that love/hate them. I'll buy that,... Dr. Cash 00:02, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I haven't seen a reliable statistic. Lentower 01:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

E.g.
{{cite book}}
{{cite conference}}
{{cite encyclopedia}}
{{cite journal}}
{{cite news}}
{{cite newsgroup}}
{{cite paper}}
{{cite press release}}
{{cite video}}
{{cite web}}

Others exist. See the summary page, and Category:Citation templates.

thanks either way! Lentower 21:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

It's important to point out that these templates are actually only recommendations. I personally absolutely, positively hate them. It's too much of a pain to remember all of the variable names, and put them in, and the organization of the variables make it very difficult to read edit pages with these stupid things in them. They also do not follow any standard reference format (e.g. APA, ACS, Harvard referencing), and their formatting for dates is completely farked up. It's just much, much easier to manually format the references. Until they fix their formatting issues, I strongly encourage editors to avoid them like the plague. Dr. Cash 21:29, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

They are only recommendations. But WP is meant for the readers, not the editors, and readers prefer consistency within a website, particularly one they use a lot. The {{cite X...}} templates provide that. Currently we have near-anarchy in citation styles, both within this article, and throughout WP. Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

If you put a linebreak before each "|", the {{cite X...}} stand out well, and are easily to visually skip while editing. Lentower 22:27, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Here is an example from this page of the two citation styles. Which is more readbale? That is, in which style can you quickly distinguish the citation from the rest of the text?

What's being used on the page so far

 * [[Frank Wickhorst]] – [[University of 
 California, Berkley|Gamma Gamma]] –
 [[University of California, Berkley]] Football
 Coach ([[1946]])<ref>''[[Alpha Phi Omega|Torch
 and Trefoil]].'' [[March]], [[1940]]. Vol. 15,
 No. 1. p. 5.</ref>
 * Sidney Williams – [[Southern
 University|Kappa Lambda]]  – [[National 
 Football League|NFL]] player for the [[Cleveland
 Browns]], [[Washington Redskins]],  [Baltimore
 Colts]], and [[Pittsburgh Steelers]] (1964-?); 
 [[United States|US]] [[Ambassador]] to
 [[Bahamas|The Bahamas]]  (March [[1994]]-
 September [[1998]]). President and Chief 
 Executive Officer of the Williams Group. Member
 of the  [[Board of Directors]] of OneUnited Bank.
 Husband of [[Maxine Waters]], [[United States 
 House of Representatives|US House]]  Member 
 from [[California]].

The {{cite X...}} templates style

 * [[Frank Wickhorst]] – [[University of 
 California, Berkley|Gamma Gamma]] –
 [[University of California, Berkley]] Football
 Coach ([[1946]])<ref>{{cite journal
  | author = Alpha Phi Omega
  | authorlink = [[Alpha Phi Omega]]
  | journal = Torch and Trefoil
  | volume = 15
  | issue = 1 
  | pages = 5
  | publisher = Torch and Trefoil
  | year = 1940
  | month = March
  }}</ref>
 * Sidney Williams – [[Southern
 University|Kappa Lambda]]  – [[National 
 Football League|NFL]] player for the [[Cleveland
 Browns]], [[Washington Redskins]],  [Baltimore
 Colts]], and [[Pittsburgh Steelers]] (1964-?); 
 [[United States|US]] [[Ambassador]] to
 [[Bahamas|The Bahamas]]  (March [[1994]]-
 September [[1998]]). President and Chief 
 Executive Officer of the Williams Group. Member
 of the  [[Board of Directors]] of OneUnited Bank.
 Husband of [[Maxine Waters]], [[United States 
 House of Representatives|US House]]  Member 
 from [[California]].

Yes, you scroll more with the [[Wikipedia:Citation_templates|{{cite X...}} templates]. best, Lentower 21:18, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, I've found that the date format thing isn't quite as bad as I thought. Now that I figured out how to adjust my user preferences to whatever date format I prefer. Still, perhaps they should change the default date format to something that would be more recognizable to the vast majority of non-logged in users; for example, write out the month instead of the all-numerical format that looks, IMHO, kind of geeky and can be somewhat confusing (e.g. Is 2006-04-03 April 3, 2006 or March 4, 2006? You and me might be able to figure it out, but it's not nearly as intuitive to someone non-technical). Dr. Cash 00:02, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

If you don't like the way the {{cite X...}} templates format, you can always work towards improving that, as part of the consensus building processes we have here on WP. Lentower 22:57, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. These debates usually take a ridiculously long amount of time and many times, they go nowhere,... Dr. Cash 00:02, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I find that when I present arguments that are reader-centric, instead of editor-ego rationale, closure happens sooner. Another approach is to come up with a set of citation templates, that work the way you think they should, and get them noticed. Lentower 01:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Right now it seems to be editor choice to use {{cite X...}} templates or not. Might be best for Dr. Cash and I to stop posting here, and wait and see what others say. Lentower 01:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Are there others? I haven't really seen any sign that anyone other than Dr. Cash, Lentower, and naraht are involved enough in this page to really comment. I mean you've got people who make a tweak due to something like Dartmouth University, but I can't find anyone else who has made more than two edits. (And I support Dr. Cash.) Naraht 13:26, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

OK, I'll go with the consensus and not use {{cite X...}} templates on this page. Lentower 20:47, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Proper way to do years?

Which of the following is proper

• Mayor of Boston (1990-1994)
• Mayor of Boston from 1990 to 1994
• Mayor of Boston 1990-1994

or some other combination? Also should the years be wikilinked? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Naraht (talk • contribs) 14:34, 4 January 2007 (UTC).

Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Dates_of_birth_and_death shows (1990-1994). It's inconsistent about wikilinking the years. I personally think too many wikilinks are distracting. It's better to just wikilink the notable items. There is also the convention about only wikilinking the first occurence of a phrase in an article. Lentower 03:57, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Proper way to do term of office?

Which is Proper

• Ronald Reagan - ABC - President of the United States (1980-1988) or
• Ronald Reagan - ABC - President of the United States (1981-1989)

When they were elected or when they actually served?

I suggest you check a handful of the WP articles about Presidents, and see what they do. I expect when they actually served is what WP is doing there. Lentower 22:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Proper in style usually depends on what Manual of Style you are following. Note Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style which is on the small size for an MoS. Lentower 22:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I would concur that we should mention when they actually served. As with other people on the page, the dates listed should be the dates that they were in the position that it says they were in. Dr. Cash 03:18, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

If no WP article, need citations to show notability

If there is no WP article on a brother, there needs to be a citation at the end of their entry that shows their notability. One to an issue and page in T&T is a start, but there really should be other links as well. Lentower 04:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Citations need to be added on most of these entries. I don't think individual 'citation needed' tags are needed on everything, so I've replaced it with one main tag at the top illustrating this. Dr. Cash 19:00, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Both are a good idea. Individual [citation needed] templates show editors exactly what needs to be done, which is more helpful, then the box at the top of the article. I'll add them back when I have time. Lentower 21:37, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

True. But they make the article look absolutely terrible. Dr. Cash 08:21, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

The article looks, with the [citation needed]s added back, exactly how a WikiPedia article of this quality should look. The WPian thing to do, to make this article look less "terrbile" (your judgement, not mine (the article looks fine with the [citation needed]s)), is to replace each [citation needed] with a suitable reference. If you do one person a day, the article will be free of [citation needed]s in a few months. If others join in, it will happen much faster. Having the [citation needed]s is likely to provide much more motivation to add the references, then the box at the top of the page. Writing a WP article, on those brothers without them, is another way to go. That, by itself, may not prove the connection to APO. It is also more effort, and harder to do. Lentower 13:18, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

As it is, the article fails many WP guidelines, including WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_directory. The only thing keeping it from an Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion is pure chance -- the fact that there are so many of these artcles that fail the guidelines, that it makes finding this one harder. This article, as it is, will fail an AfD and be deleted in five days, after the AfD is opened.

WP is much more about having cited articles -- in this case about notable people -- then their appearance. The appearance of an article is less important, then it meeting the WP guidelines.

As both a WPian and a brother of APO, I want this article to stay and meet the WP guidelines.That's the best way to be of service. So, Derek et al, roll up your sleeves and be of service - do the work. Lentower 13:18, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, Alpha Phi Omega's listing is better documented than either Sigma Chi or Sigma Alpha Epsilon (just to pick two GLOs with long lists). Also, I took the page with the "Citation Needed" entries on it and copied it to UNIX to do a word count. Citation and Needed were the words that occured most often in the page. I *really* don't think that is appropriate. Naraht 14:04, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Comparing articles at AfD carries no weight. The only likely effect is to get the other artciles AfDed. Lentower 22:37, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

BTW, the counts were 146 citation and 146 needed. Third place was 140 for the word of. I know that the article for Mark Cuban has been referenced as being *over* referenced and it has about 50 references. And this article should have 146 of them?

I disagree that this article would fail an AfD vote if it was nominated. There were no real problems with the list when it was part of Alpha Phi Omega, and the main reason it was split into a new article was because the list was getting a bit long to be included directly in the article. Splitting it to a new article (page) conforms to the guidelines specified in WP:LIST.

With regards to, "The article looks, with the [citation needed]s added back, exactly how a WikiPedia article of this quality should look." I'm going to take that comment as a matter of opinion, which is fine. Since Wikipedia is a work in progress, I don't think there's any set standard to how an article should look, specifically. All articles are essentially works in progress; as more information is found on a topic, editors add it in. But I do agree with Randy's assessment that 146 'citation needed's in an article is a bit excessive. One simple note at the top of the article asking editors for help ought to suffice here.

With respect to the process of finding references to insert there,... that's obviously going to take some time. Searching past Torch & Trefoils is probably one of the best options here, since famous members are most likely to be referenced here. The difficulty here is that the T&T is not available online prior to about 2002, and searches of earlier T&Ts will therefore have to be done by hand. My collection only goes back to about the mid-1990s or so (pledged in 1992 and became a Life Member in 1995). Randy probably has a more extensive collection. Yeah, I could probably contact the national office, but given that there's a convention in less than a month and they're probably still busy processing AAMDs, I don't think that a request for, "please send me all the T&Ts every published before 1995," is going to go very far.

I've also been trying various combinations of google searches for some of the members, hoping to find an article in a mainstream media source on them, or even a bio page at their work or corporate website. This worked pretty well for Robert Gates, but a lot of these people don't have fraternity memberships on their bio pages, and news articles are fairly scarce that actually mention APO. We can, however, verify that many of these people are actually members, based on looking them up in the national membership database and verifying that the person in question attended the school at roughly the right time that they joined, etc. And I think Randy has been pretty diligent at working with the National Office in verifying membership here. But these lookups aren't necessarily admissable as reference citations in the article. So I'm open to suggestions in how to find suitable references here. Dr. Cash 20:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the T&Ts that I've been looking through are those on a CD that Michael Brown sent out to his fellow members of the History and Archives Committee. Probably about half of the T&Ts and Lightbearers are there, but it isn't an even distribution, almost all of the ones for the 1940s are there and almost none in the 1976-1986 timeframe are in there.

Also, as far as I'm concerned the T&T are primary records. Given the fact that non even all of the 14 founders are on the online records at the National Website, I'm not going to drop someone just because they aren't there (as long as they initiated before about 1980).

I think 146 references looks almost as bad as 146 Content Needed's.... Naraht 21:37, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Responding to my own comment. Having said that 146 references are too many, we now have 178. :) Naraht 14:15, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Many Chapters keep archives of old T&Ts. Contact those near to you and see what's possible?

If you don't like including references in articles, should you be editing on WP? References are much smaller then [citation needed]s, and are links to useful information. Both make them more attractive. Several references in a brother's entry are quite acceptable. Lentower 22:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I do agree that references are actually quite an important part of an article, and not just a wikipedia article. For example, in the scientific literature, it's quite valuable to be able to go back to past publications and see some of the older experiments that were done, and compare that to the current publication. In wikipedia, adding a reasonable number of links to articles (or even a non-internet-link to an offline resource) provides someone reading wikipedia with a great resource for future research. Plus, it looks a lot better than adding a bunch of external links into an external links section. But I think we could forego the reference on somebody if they have a wikipedia article and said wikipedia article notes (and references) that they were members of Alpha Phi Omega. Dr. Cash 23:00, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, if all the info in a brother's List entry, is in his/her WP article, and the info is fully cited there, the WikiLink from the List is citation enough on the List entry. By having the only ref be that WikiLink, an editor is claiming this to be true. If it isn't, an editor should either make the article right, or add [citation needed]s to the brother's list entry and the article. Lentower 23:17, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

So where in the line and how many references should there be for each entry? Case A: Brother A has a Wikipedia page referencing them. Case B: Brother B does not have a Wikipedia page. Also, does it make a difference in Case A as to whether there is actually a reference on the fact that they are a brother? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Naraht (talk • contribs) 13:12, 7 December 2006 (UTC).

Featured list?

This list is getting pretty comprehensive, and definitely well-referenced. While it doesn't exactly meet the criteria for being a featured article (and probably never will), I think it might be worth trying to shoot for the comparable status for lists, featured list status. Review the featured list criteria here and leave comments on the talk page about possible improvements. Coincidentally, the List of notable Eagle Scouts is already a featured list. So we might use that as a guideline. Dr. Cash 22:18, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Designating for APO-Phil?

OK, how do we do Alpha Phi Omega-Philippines chapters... Choices

• Different wikipedia page
• (Phil) or (Philippines) after the chapter name with the chapter name going to a different place so we have Joe Smith - [[Lafayette College|Alpha]] - info and Jose Suran - Alpha (Philippines) - info on him
• other ideas?

For now I'm going to go with the second, it should be reasonably easy to split them out later if necessary. Naraht 19:02, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Another possibility is the flag of the Philippines

Naraht 13:52, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I've identified three individuals that are members of APO-RP, and have added the flagicon template next to their name. Dr. Cash 01:32, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

List order

I've reordered the list as an alphabetical list, with each letter as a subsection, similar to the way the List of Eagle Scouts (Boy Scouts of America) is set up. Since honorary members no longer have their own main section, I created a small pin similar to the service pin, but with a tiny 'H' in it, to denote honorary membership.

I suppose we could also put the small flag icon next to this to denote famous members of APO-RP, as brother Finder suggests above. Dr. Cash 01:04, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

The list was rearranged from alphabetical order to sorting by major categories, per comments in the Featured List Candidate Review Process. Dr. Cash 21:32, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Walter C. Coffey is in Business, not sure why... Naraht 14:16, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. Thanks! Dr. Cash 17:15, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Order of honors/jobs

What is the standard order to list honors or positions? Chronological, Chronological inverted, importance?

For example, if Brother Mark Plotz was Mayor of Omaha (1970-1976), Governor of Nebraska (1976-1980), Senator from Nebraska (1980-1986) and Mayor of Lincoln (1988-1992), is this the order it should go in? Or should most important go first. The only reason this seems odd, is that doing Bill Clinton and *not* having President of the United States first seems wierd (vs. the time spent as Governor of Arkansas)Naraht 13:19, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Table listing

What do people think of doing this the way that Alpha Phi Alpha is doing it with Templates that create tables?Naraht 13:45, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

I personally don't like the table listing, and would favor the current format over it. But several reviewers on this article's featured list nomination suggested it, so I'd be interested to hear what others have to say. Dr. Cash 20:28, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Eh, I really think the table format looks like crap, and highly favor what we've already got going over it. Justinm1978 04:54, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Current count

Current count of names is 243!Naraht 19:02, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Listing in articles

What would be the preference for listing membership in an article:

• Brother of Alpha Phi Omega
• Alpha Phi Omega brother

--Gadget850 ( Ed) 13:01, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Right now the count is fourteen for BoAPO and three for APOB. However it appears that all of the BoAPO are in the article text and all of the APOB are in Awards and Honors boxes. Not sure if that is enough consistency or if we want to be consistent across the article text and the boxes.Naraht 13:44, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an APO member, so I am soliciting the preference of those with an invested interest in the APO. I have been creating the AAH boxes and noticed I was including this in different ways (probably cutting and pasting from the article.) I have also started a discussion at Template talk:Infobox Person about adding an awards field to that template (which is more comprehensive than {{Infobox Biography}}. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 14:39, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Or; should it be "members" instead of "brothers", as illustrated by this article title? --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:03, 18 July 2007 (UTC).

The reason for Members in the title here is that not all notable members of Alpha Phi Omega are brothers, women in Alpha Phi Omega of the Philippines are Sisters. If we attempt to split this article into APO-USA and APO-Phil (which I think is probably coming within the year), then it would be Notable Alpha Phi Omega (USA) Brothers and Notable Alpha Phi Omega (Philippines) Brothers and Sisters. Please use whatever they are, so James Lovell would be Alpha Phi Omega Brother in the boxes. Naraht 12:15, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

OK- Alpha Phi Omega brother and Alpha Phi Omega honorary brother. Next question- would "brother" and "honorary brother" in this context be capitalized? --Gadget850 ( Ed) 12:49, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Lower case, I think..., sorry for the mistype.Naraht 14:43, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

No problem- just want to see what the style preference is here, as the BSA and the APO overlap in many areas. You might want to note this in the talk page header in case it comes up again. See Talk:National Scout jamboree (Boy Scouts of America) for a style messagebox. I think I will note this on Wikipedia:WikiProject Scouting/Style. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:19, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

John P. Giesy

Please take a look at http://hcr3.isiknowledge.com/author.cgi?id=1037&cb=15 and http://www.msu.edu/~giesy/ . I think he should be added to the Science, medicine and technology grouping. Let me know what you all think.Naraht 15:58, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Featured list

In order to help this list to be featured, you might want to use the templates on FRAT. miranda 02:41, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

JFK

I think I should be the one to address this, as I have some firsthand knowledge of the subject. John F. Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States DID accept honorary membership in the Epsilon Mu chapter at The University of Maryland. He is listed as a Brother on their roster at the National Office. A shingle (membership certificate) was issued as well as a membership card. They are on file at the National Office in Missouri. I have held them in my hands. However, Kennedy was killed in Dallas before the Initiation could take place. That's why the membership materials were never sent out.

It has recently come to light that President Kennedy was Initiated into Eta Phi BEFORE he accepted honorary membership at Epsilon Mu. Brothers can, of course, be members of multiple chapters. I have a friend who is in at least FOUR. However, it seems that the policy on this article is to only list a Brother's chapter of first membership. I support that policy. This article will become a complete and utter mess if we start listing multiple memberships.

To the anonymous editor(s) that keep changing it, please stop. I am a Brother of Epsilon Mu myself. I was disappointed when I found out about the Eta Phi thing, but I got over it. It's been verified. You cannot change history. You must however, change your understanding of it as new facts come to light. Henrymrx (talk) 23:28, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Oddly enough, I'm in the other direction on this. We already have three people on the list with multiple verified chapters listed. Listing JFK as both Eta Phi and Epsilon Mu would not violate any policy on this list. Also, honorary brothers do not have to go through the initiation ceremony in order to become a brother, or to become a brother of the chapter that has offered them honorary membership. If JFK intended to go to Epsilon Mu to accept it in person, then I would count that as having accepted the honorary membership in Epsilon Mu chapter. I would be happy to have both listed, perhaps with a footnote on the Epsilon Mu membership to explain further. That I think would be more appropriate than not listing Epsilon Mu at all. Naraht (talk) 03:36, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

I could go either way in this. I do agree that, for a wikipedia page, we don't want to clutter up the page with 3 or 4 chapter affiliations. But on the flipside, brothers who are affiliated with multiple chapters are still a minority -- most brothers are going to have a single chapter affiliation (it's only the alumni volunteers and advisors that might have two or more). So I don't think it's a serious issue if we had a few of the 'notable members' listed with multiple chapters of affiliation. (PS -- Ms. Stewart, last time I checked, definitely is affiliated with more than four chapters: VT, VCU, Ferrum, Howard, Randolph-Macon, ODU = 6; and probably going to be adding Regent when they charter, and possibly NSU; I wonder if that's a record or something? ;-). Dr. Cash (talk) 15:31, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Splitting APO-Phil?

I've seen two significant lists of APO-Philippines alumni at http://betasigmachapter.multiply.com/journal/item/145/List_of_outstanding_APO_Alumni (which originally comes from http://docs.google.com/View?docID=ajd4f6k5cp6f_82fk6phgfb, I believe) and an Eta chapter (which is UP-Diliman, the main campus of the National University and arguably the most presitigious school) list at http://www.upapo.org/apo-eta-alumni/

The wikipedia list is already pretty long and by National Organization seems the most logical way to split things. Any feelings on whether we should do this? Also, if so, what should we use for the names of the resulting pages? Naraht (talk) 13:58, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

I disagree on splitting the list. While it's long, I don't think that's a problem. I think it's better to have one list of all notable APO-members, rather than two separate lists. Dr. Cash (talk) 01:02, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

And the lists that I got have many people who I wouldn't add, though I haven't gotten all the way through them. I'll keep that idea for later, maybe after we get some APO-Phil brothers who can help.Naraht (talk) 13:18, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Reorganization ideas.

I'd like to hear your opinions on the following ideas for reorganization.

• Split Politics and Government into two different groupings based on whether the most significant position held is one that they are elected to or not. So Pres. Bill Clinton and Sen. Mark Hatfield would go in the Politics group, but Assistant SoS Maura Harty and Maryland Chief Justice Bell would go in the Government group.
• Split Academia somehow, it is the longest other one. Unfortunately, the only split that comes to mind is to split off University presidents who have been made honorary brothers and that's just lame.
• Split by Country. We have a *lot* more notable APO-Phil brothers than we did a couple of years ago. Does that split make sense? We'd have to rename the page though.
• Use the {{FratMemberStart}} {{FratMember}} {{FratMemberEnd}} entries like the List of Alpha Phi Alpha brothers does. Note, I don't approve of all of the founders of APhiA being on that list, but I don't care that much and I'm *quite* sure that there are people who are very much in favor of it, and would be willing to fight it in any way possible.

Naraht (talk) 16:20, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Anyone have an opinion on any of the above splits? Naraht (talk) 01:50, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

While I'm not a huge fan of the templates, and prefer the simple prose-based list we have, it might make sense to convert to using the templates if we want to make another run for featured list. That was one of the issues they brought up during the previous nomination. Dr. Cash (talk) 01:06, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Maybe if I can figure out some way to automate the change (at least to some degree).Naraht (talk) 13:20, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

new tables

I've noticed Naraht has gone to a tabular format for the list, which is fine. But the enormous spaces that begin each section due to photo placement in the right column really need to be dealt with. Dr. Cash (talk) 22:36, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't the one who put it into tabular format, Absolon was. But, any ideas?Naraht (talk) 10:58, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

I've reduced the percentages on the tables and it appears better now. I think it's more of a monitor-dependent thing, since it's a percentage. While I do have widescreen monitors, I do not set my browser width to the full width of the monitor, to allow for easier multi-tasking. Dr. Cash (talk) 19:11, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Additional Images?

It sort of looks odd to have no images in the Business section and Non-Profit sections. Any suggestions for images there? I can't seem to find any good images for Business, but I would appreciate someone rechecking for me. The Non-Profit seems to be mostly BSA officers and Mr. Tower, I think they'd balance each other pretty well, so maybe one BSA founder, one BSA more recent President and Mr. Tower? Opinions?Naraht (talk) 14:14, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

After I started this, I realized that the images didn't necessarily line up with the section they were next to, for example Chuck Robb is in Academia. a) Do we want to move them, and b) who do we want from Non-Profit: Beard, Fisher, Goodman, Head, Thurman, Tower or West? (I'm thinking about 3 of them...)Naraht (talk) 16:03, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Alpha Phi Omega National Office notice of this page.

The National Office has decided that updating the Notable Alumni on the national website something that should be done soon. I was contacted to see if I knew of any notable alumni that should be added and I directed the National Office to this wikipedia page. To put it mildly, they were speechless. :) Among those being *considered* for addition at this time are all verifiable ex-presidents who are Honorary (Hoover, Ike, Kennedy, Ford, Carter(?), GHWB), Maura Hardy and Sen Holden from the Pledge Manual, Robert Gates, Carson Kressley and Luther McIlwain (Tuskegee Airman who spoke at the convention in Boston and was made an Honorary brother there). The list of those being considered will likely expand based on the information on this page. :) Naraht (talk) 19:37, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

They weren't including Michelle Obama? Henrymrx (talk) 20:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Oops, I knew I forgot someone. They fully intend to add Michelle Obama. OTOH, they intend to not include Hillary Clinton. Apparently Senator Clinton didn't sign her honorary membership application. Wierd. Naraht (talk) 22:16, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

This is good. It's about time they updated that. I've actually been working on the bios on the national website the past month as well -- I'll be doing the code and database work for this page on apo.org. It's possible that we could also have a link at the bottom of that page to this one, but I wouldn't bet on it quite yet. Dr. Cash (talk) 20:11, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

It is also possible that the Pledge Manual may have a note indicating that more notable alumni may be found at the Wikipedia page.

Also, what is the proper way working through links on the page to get to the bios page. I've always gotten to it through google.Naraht (talk) 22:16, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

File:Alpha Phi Omega honorary.png

File:Alpha Phi Omega honorary.png is a non-free image being used as an icon, a decorative use that fails the Wikipedia:non-free content criteria. Specifically, the requirements for minimal use and contextual significance. This image may not meet the threshold for copyright and could be re-tagged— this could be discussed at Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. Otherwise a free image can be developed for this use— see the DESA icon used in List of Eagle Scouts (Boy Scouts of America). ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 11:21, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Advisors, Honorary Members

Other fraternity member lists do not include advisors and honorary members. I don't see why these people should be included; it is pretty easy to offer someone an honorary membership in an organization, and without any evidence that the offer was even accepted or that the person became involved with the organization... well, at the very least, I don't think that they should be listed side-by-side with members whose membership in the organization might well have been an important part of their life story. And advisors might well advise multiple organizations, and how much they are involved with APO probably varies. I think I am going to go ahead and remove these entries. Brianyoumans (talk) 15:04, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

The references given are not "Alpha Phi Omega offered honorary members to", it is to "Alpha Phi Omega honorary membership was accepted by".Naraht (talk) 15:25, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Well, that is slightly better. But we are still talking about someone signing a piece of paper, not being an active member of the organization. Here's an idea: maybe the honorary members should be separated out into a short form list at the end, just a list of names? I think that a list of _actual_ members of the fraternity who are notable would be more interesting and have more impact than a long list of notable people who have signed pieces of paper. The same could be said of advisors, although it seems like some of the advisors were deeply involved in the organization, while some might have been merely advisors in name only, or for a short time. They are a harder problem. I would vote for eliminating them as well, in favor of emphasizing actual student members. Brianyoumans (talk) 16:02, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Advisors are full members of Alpha Phi Omega, are expected to go through the ritual and can vote for a chapter if no student members are present. And, for example, the fact that President Eisenhower became an honorary member of Alpha Phi Omega was covered in the New York times. It seems to me that a decision that person X because they were an advisor or an honorary brother was not involved in the Fraternity or did sign the paper to be an honorary brother without thinking represents WP:OR. Also, the "honorary pin" was a creation to separate out more clearly those who are Honorary from those who are initiated brothers.Naraht (talk) 16:22, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I think the real question here is, what is more likely to say something significant and interesting about this person? Obviously, sometimes even membership as a student will have little impact on a person's life, but I think on the whole that the fact that someone was a student member of APO is something significant and interesting, something that someone learning about that person's life might want to know. Now, how likely is it that accepting honorary membership will have an impact on someone's life? Does the fact that a person accepted honorary membership in APO say something significant about them? Is it something that someone learning about them might want to know? I think it is unlikely. Brianyoumans (talk) 16:34, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

OTOH, if advisors are considered basically full members... well, perhaps they should be kept. Brianyoumans (talk) 16:37, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

The level of impact that you discuss seems to be something that would more apply to the question as to whether the person should be included in the Alpha Phi Omega Category, which to me is considerably higher than what is true here (the only people who are in the Alpha Phi Omega Category are the first two presidents of the fraternity, the second of which is notable for being mayor of Kansas City Missouri). Also, there is a difference between the criteria as to whether the "John Smythe is a honorary member of X" fact belongs on the page of X's members and the page for John Smythe.Naraht (talk) 16:48, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

General Offer on Torch and Trefoil refs

If anyone has questions on reference a Torch and Trefoil (The fraternity magazine for most of its history), I can email. I believe I have the scanned PDFs for almost all of them listed. (Note, these are image PDFs rather than OCRed, but the page number is given for all of the references, I believe.Naraht (talk) 16:58, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Comments beyond Alpha Phi Omega...

Two things.

• List of Alpha Phi Alpha brothers is a Featured List and a large number of the educators listed there are presidents of HBCUs like Delaware State. If a President of Delaware State without a page is notable enough for a Featured List, then I don't think there are too many of the University Presidents that should be dropped.

• I would note that inclusion of persons without articles was an issue raised in the discussion of featured status - see Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Alpha Phi Alpha brothers. The editor pushing the designation brushed it off, but it was raised as an issue.Brianyoumans (talk) 17:19, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

• And then the person who raised it agreed with the editor pushing for the designation, which to me indicates that not only User:Ccson agrees with me, but so does User:Crzycheetah. Also there were others who supported it to FL even with that. (now if you want *real* heartburn take a look at the List of Alpha Kappa Alpha sisters which is also an FL. If it isn't cleaned up to the standards that it had when it was approved, I'd support removing it from FL.Naraht (talk) 17:29, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

• Should asking for contributions from Wikipedia:WikiProject Fraternities and Sororities be useful?Naraht (talk) 16:53, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Ummmm....

"Baby Boy Imam"? I think I want to see a reference that clearly shows this person's existence! It totally sounds like a hoax. And War Eagles IV-VI? How did they help out with the chapter's work - catch rats in local low-income apartments? Carry injured animals across the street in their beaks? Brianyoumans (talk) 17:31, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

OK, it's a nickname, I found his real name - Nashrullah Ambolodto Imam. I suppose "Baby Boy" is easier to say. Brianyoumans (talk) 17:41, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

If you think it would be better as Nashrullah Ambolodto "Baby Boy" Imam, I'm fine with that, but I actually find more links *with* the nickname. (Which leads to the question of what *his* page should be titled, but he isn't even on the tl: or tcl: versions of Wikipedia. During the time that Auburn had War Eagles IV-VI, Alpha Phi Omega was responsible for their care (see War Eagle). I've only run across one other non-human honorary brother, one of the Connecticut Huskies, but I don't think my reference indicated which of the ones from VII to XII it was, so I didn't include it.Naraht (talk) 18:03, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Non-notables

Lists of persons in Wikipedia should be lists of "notable" persons - which translates as "they have a Wikipedia page, or else one could be written for them". I'm eliminating persons on the list without articles. If you think some of them should be added back, well, write an article on that person. Or else include some good reasons why they are notable, with references. I don't think, for instance, that Wikipedia needs an article on every college president, particularly ones for less notable institutiions or ones who served for only a few years. Brianyoumans (talk) 15:04, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I think that a significant amount of Wikipedia disagrees with you on University Presidents. For example Bates College in Maine, which I know of, but only because I'm fairly knowledgable on Universities (I'm in the DC area). All Nine of the schools presidents have Wikipedia pages. (I just went through Category:Presidents by university or college in the United States until I found a school that I wasn't absolutely familiar with. Where can the Notability Criteria be checked to see if University Presidents should all be considered notable. Also, one of the removed people was a founding advisor to the National Fraternity. Note, I'll say at the beginning, I have a significant COI, I'm on the History Committee for Alpha Phi Omega.Naraht (talk) 15:24, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I am basing my removal of persons who do not currently have Wikipedia articles on Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(stand-alone_lists)#Lists_of_people, which says that persons on lists should in almost all cases meet notability requirements. As to whether all university presidents (and note that not everyone I removed was one; I just happened to start on the Education list) are notable, I will try to see if there is a consensus on that.Brianyoumans (talk) 15:39, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

If you look at WP:Notability (academics), it says things like "presidents of major academic institutions" or "significant academic institutions". A bit vague, unsurprisingly. There also has to be sufficient verifiable material for an article. I'm a bit of a deletionist, myself, so my take would be that unless the person clearly deserves an article, for now remove the entry. Brianyoumans (talk) 15:56, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I agree that it is vague, but I really think you went too far. If Harrison C. Dale is not notable, are you maintaining that University of Idaho is not a significant academic institution?Naraht (talk) 16:19, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

It's a marginal case. You could certainly argue that. However, I think that "does this person have an article?" is a simple and easy way to answer the notability question, at least for the purposes of this article.Brianyoumans (talk) 16:27, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Simple and Easy, but not IMO correct. The statement you made at the top is "else one could be written for them". There are 8300 hits for "Harrison C. Dale" on Google, I think that's probably enough to write one, it just isn't my priority right now and there are other Presidents of University of Idaho with articles. If there are any of the ones removed with say 83 hits, I'd agree that there probably isn't enough to write an article about them.Naraht (talk) 16:38, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I notice that "black links" were raised as an issue in the Peer Review that you requested back in 2010, with about the same arguments as I'm making. I don't think it is reasonable to have to go through every person in the list who doesn't have an article and argue about whether or not they are notable. There are hundreds of thousands of biographical articles in Wikipedia already; if a person doesn't have one already, it is a good sign that they might be kind of marginal. I would say take 'em out.Brianyoumans (talk) 17:01, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I have asked for another opinion at the WP:Third or "Third Opinion" site. Let's see if we get some words of wisdom...Brianyoumans (talk) 02:38, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi, I'm a Third Opinion Wikipedian and saw this listed at the Third Opinion project. I'm afraid that while Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Stand-alone lists#Lists of people (aka WP:LISTPEOPLE) comes close to saying that individuals may be removed from lists merely for not having an article about them, it doesn't quite say that. Indeed, it expressly says that individuals can be included in lists without having articles about them in certain circumstances. Taken out of context, that would seem to imply that when those circumstances do not apply (and I see no suggestion here that they might) that not having an article is enough for removal, but Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Stand-alone lists also states a general rule for that situation in WP:CSC:

"Common selection criteria: Every entry meets the notability criteria for its own non-redirect article in the English Wikipedia. Red-linked entries are acceptable if the entry is verifiably a member of the listed group, and it is reasonable to expect an article could be forthcoming in the future. This standard prevents Wikipedia from becoming an indiscriminate list, and prevents individual lists from being too large to be useful to readers. Most of the best lists on Wikipedia reflect this type of editorial judgment."

(Emphasis added. Just to head off a possible argument, note that in regard to the future article, it does not say, "immediate" or "near" future, and it does say, "could be" forthcoming, not "will be" forthcoming.) In this light, my opinion is that removing items from a stand-alone list of people merely because there is no article about them is not an acceptable practice; there must be a deeper inquiry than just that involving notability, the possibility of a future article about them, WP:BLP1E, and WP:BIO1E. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 15:40, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

OK, in response to the above, here is a list of "black links" that I feel could readily be removed. I think removing these would improve the article.

Academia

• Edward F. Clark - an honorary member; only served as a college president for 5-6 years, at a lesser-known school
• Earle W. Clifford - spent one year as president of an obscure national association of student personnel administrators
• Robert Crouch - president of a college for one year
• Robert D. Flanigan - a college administrator, not a president
• Carl W. Knox - another one-year president of the "National Association of Student Personnel Administrators"; also honorary only
• Henry J. Martin - honorary, and only a college president for a brief time, apparently
• William Samuel Sadler - a college administrator, not a president
• Hurford E. Stone - an acting president

Business

• Eugene Eckel - AT&T exec; my search didn't bring up much else of interest about him
• Wallace O. Lee - corporate executive at smallish utility; I don't think the bit about the APO prize is significant
  • Info about the prize deleted. I wonder why Life Magazine focused on him though.

Entertainment and Sports

• John F. (Jack) Green - a head coach of short duration; also only an advisor. I have a friend named Jack Greene - it's a very common name. For a while he kept getting pulled over and handcuffed because there was a warrant out for a Jack Green(e) with the same birthday.
  • So? If his name was John Medricostas, it would make no difference.
    • I just thought it was a funny story. Especially since my friend was small and Jewish, and the wanted man was a tall African-American man.Brianyoumans (talk) 13:35, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
      • Well *that* answers the question, he has a Wikipedia page (which surprised me).Naraht (talk) 14:35, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Government and Politics

• Robert P. Kingsbury - a third party candidate for Congress
  • But now as a member of the NH House, OK.
• Gilberto F. Layese - a government official in the Philippines; doesn't sound major enough to merit an article
  • Director of one of the 8 pieces of the Philippine Department of Agriculture. Equivalent level in the US would be something like the head of the United States Forest Service, which IMO would be notable enough.

Science

• James Frederick Young - a research executive

Scouts

(I've asked for help on WP:SCOUT)

• Marsh M. Ammerman - an assistant chief executive of the Boy Scouts, for 5 years or so
• Elmaar Bakken - honorary; another Boy Scout administrator
• Shawn Edward Bowman, Jr. - a 9/11 victim and scout leader
  • Probably counts as WP:BLP1E
• Frank Braden - another scouting official; also only honorary
• Harry Eby - ditto
• Stanley Harris - ditto
• Thomas Keane - ditto
• Perry Lint - ditto
• Harold F. Pote - ditto
• Jim Terry - ditto except a regular member
• Delmer Wilson - ditto

Service and Non-Profit

• Robert E. Lee Hill - president of Rotary for one year
• Roland Nicholson, Jr. - activist in New York State on prison issues; legislative staffer; doesn't seem article meterial to me

In general, I guess I don't share your fascination with college officials and scouting officials... I'll leave you to make these changes or not. BTW: Shouldn't Michelle Obama be marked as honorary? Brianyoumans (talk) 16:03, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

This seems like a reasonable way to handle the issue. Let me get to the end of the reference check and I'll respond to each. Michelle Obama is was an advisor to the chapter (and in fact an advisor of the rechartering group), not an honorary brother. Oddly enough as a quick check to see whether one I picked as minor (Robert Kingbury) should be removed, I found out that in 2010 he ran for and won a seat in the New Hampshire House. Does being a successful member of the New Hampshire House qualify him even if running for Congress third party doesn't? A good number of the scouting and college officials are the ones that come from the Fraternity Magazine "Torch and Trefoil". (that I found when I worked through all of them that I could locate)Naraht (talk) 18:46, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, being a state rep qualifies him (although in New Hampshire, given the number of them, that is a very low bar.) It is certainly possible that more notabiility can be found on some of these - I didn't do comprehensive searches on them.Brianyoumans (talk) 20:21, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

I'd love to see someone propose setting the bar so that the other 49 state legislatures and the New Hampshire senate qualify for making someone notable, but not the NH House. I wouldn't vote for it, but I'd be fine with someone making the proposal... :)Naraht (talk) 20:32, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Feel free to cut him off the list regardless. He has no article. All the guideline means is, "If someone writes an article on a person who is a state rep, and someone else takes the article to Articles for Deletion, it is unlikely that it will get deleted." It doesn't mean that there is any priority for writing an article, or even that there really SHOULD be an article.Brianyoumans (talk) 20:55, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

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