Talk:Malvern, Worcestershire/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

What does this mean?

The article lede contains the following:

Great Malvern on the eastern flank of the Malvern Hills and on the western perimeter of The Malverns is the main urban centre

What are The Malverns here?. Normally I'd read that name as short form for The Malvern Hills, but that reading renders the above sentence utterly meaningless (you clearly cannot be simultaneously on the eastern flank and the western perimeter of a range of hills). Can anybody explain what this sentence is trying, but IMHO failing, to say. -- Starbois (talk) 18:58, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I have rewritten and expanded much of this article. Kudpung (talk) 10:00, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Merging

Survery

• Strong oppose Great Malvern is a town in Malvern, all British towns have their own articles! If anything, Malvern, Worcestershire should be merged to Great Malvern, and the surrounding appropriate articles. Ideally Malvern, Worcestershire should only be a disambiguation page. Jenuk1985 | Talk 13:27, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Discussion

Malvern, Great Malvern, the Malvern district, the Hills, and all the other Malverns, now make a rather complex collection of articles. I'm suggesting looking at merging some of this is some way or another. Best to reply on my talk page. Kudpung (talk) 09:34, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, in principle I support a merge. To make the discussion a bit more concrete, would you collect a list of exactly which pages you are proposing to merge? GyroMagician (talk) 14:44, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

After now having edited and expanded almost all the pages that concerning Malvern in any way, I come to the conclusion that the confusion is between the article Malvern, about the large, informal, singly unparished area that includes all the Malvern localities and their stubs, and the article that specifically discusses Great Malvern as the Malvern Town civil parish and its role as the main, but not geographically central part of the Malvern 'connurbation'.
Rather than a merging, a possible shift either way in the focus of the content of each article may be a better solution, but would incur a carefully planned major rewrite of each, to ensure that people seeking info on the area do not miss any significant facts. Time permitting, I will prepare some tentative draft articles for discussion. Kudpung (talk) 04:25, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

The main problems is between Malvern and Great Malvern. Some of the info from Great Malvern should be moved to Malvern Iccaldwell (talk) 19:04, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed also. I hope to have a possible draft for discussion sometime soon. In anticipation, some extension to both articles is still being carried out. Kudpung (talk) 03:47, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi Kudpung, Iccaldwell, and others. I think the following should be merged into this article: Great Malvern, Malvern Link, Malvern Wells, North Malvern, Little Malvern, West Malvern and Barnards Green. For anyone unfamiliar with Malvern, it is confusing to have so many Malverns and most of those pages are unlikely to be read. A lot of information is also duplicated between them. For example, while Morgan are based in the Link, most people (reasonably) think of them as being based in Malvern. The first paragraph of this page explains it well. But I'm interested to see your drafts Kudpung, and my mind could easily be changed ;-) GyroMagician (talk) 10:06, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I've removed the merge & improve templates. They are ugly, and there are enough of us actively working on this article now, and checking that I don't go OTT with my contribs. The more I work on this with your help, I realise that there are workarounds without needing to merge the articles, such as disambig pages and some cross referencing using tags without duplicating info. Some stuff needs to stay in both for a while, but left a teasers for the pages that have the main content, or, as in the example of Malvern Water, to a newly created page.--Kudpung (talk) 17:53, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Kudpung (and others), should this article be restricted to the civil parish, or should it be about Malvern (or The Malverns) in general? I prefer the latter, but I'm open to discussion. I think most people who come here will be looking for something general. I prefered this version of the introduction, which I think it describes Malvern well. GyroMagician (talk) 13:57, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Merging such articles is a bad idea, they are all separate places that happen to share a common word in their name, and it goes against the Wikipedia logic that separate villages have separate articles. If anything, *this* article should be merged out into those articles, as I understand it, there isn't a town or village simply called "Malvern"? That is where the confusion is arriving, this article is regarding a place which doesn't really exist, Great Malvern is the town. Jenuk1985 | Talk 12:04, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi Jenuk1985, welcome aboard! I now agree that the articles should not be merged (see Merging & Improving below). I would also oppose merging this article into those. While Malvern is not a formally defined town, it certainly exists as a locally recognised place - for e.g. I grew up in Barnards Green, but always describe myself as being from Malvern. The collection of towns/villages do have a common identity. I would like to see this article carry general Malvern information, and the sub-articles (Malvern Link, etc) include information specific to those parts of Malvern. GyroMagician (talk) 13:28, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Oops, I'm sure all that discussion below wasn't there before! Lol, I think I'm going blind in my young age! This particular article could do with being cut down to nothing more than a summary of the area, with {{main|blar blar}} links as appropriate. Just so you know what relation I have to Malvern... none! My only connection is being in the same county :) Jenuk1985 | Talk 13:36, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Puts you a lot closer than me - I'm currently living in Lausanne! As to cutting down, I think it's tricky. For example, RSRE/DERA/Qinetiq is internationally known for being in Malvern, but had a site in Malvern Link and still has a site in Barnards Green. I think it is best listed on this page, as it had a significant impact on the whole of Malvern. GyroMagician (talk) 17:13, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Who is closest?

After reading the entire thread above again, all the Malvern articles, and many talk pages of other groups of editors who have had similar situaltions to resolve, I've come to a few conclusions. But first a bit of background: I grew up in Malvern in several parts of the area including very close to the very centre of Great Malvern, the Link, and Barnards Green where I still have a home. When I was a kid, I had a couple of jobs that forced me to get to know the area as well as a postman. I agree that all these 'Malverns' are confusing. However, for the locals, the whole place is generally just 'Malvern' to any outsiders, and among themselves they refer to 'up the Wells', down the Link, down the (barnards) Green, or just to the informal names of some of the very large housing estates. The point is, that none of the locals would be able to draw a boundary around those places, and if you start a discussion about in a pub, it would go on all night, and since the new licencing laws, it does too. It's a favourite bar stool debate.
These are not separate villages. Apart from the four that are Civil Parishes in their own right, they are just informal names for suburbs and as such, places like Barnards Green and Malvern Link shouldn't strictly have a Wiki page of their own at all, although maybe in history, they were independent parishes.

• Poolbrook,
• Wyche, Upper
• Wyche, Lower
• Malvern Link,
• Link Top
• Sherrards Green,
• Hall Green
• Barnards Green
• Great Malvern
• North Malvern
• Cowleigh,

These places:

• Malvern Wells
• Newland
• Little Malvern
• West Malvern

are Civil Parishes in their own right and therefore administratively have nothing to do with Malvern, but are part of the 'The Malverns', the informal region. I've tried to explain the situation in the intro, but not very well, because it still leaves Januk confused - which means we're not there yet.
The question is where Great Malvern begins and ends, and do we go by electoral boundaries, or by traditional ones? Malvern Town doesn't exist, but it's the official administrative area of the Malvern Council that covers the area we call Malvern and these areas in it. The Wiki is clear enough that provable, formal sources should be used wherever possible, therefore, Malvern = the area governed by Malvern Town Council = the Civil parish combining most of those named areas, including Great Malvern which is a name informally given to the part considered to be the town's centre and was previously the largest of the villages in the immediate area.
If Wiki says we should have a page for every village, does that mean also for every suburb? Perhaps the Common Sense rule should prevail, because we need to draw the (boundary) line somewhere. That line could be the Civil parishes. If we adopt that rationale, then we have a major article about 'Malvern, Worcestershire' that includes its 'areas' without a special sections of them, but by alluding to them with statements in other sub sections such as 'Morgan Motors, located in Malvern Link to the east of the town centre, have been building cars since blah blah...' and 'The Chase School, in the area known as Barnards Green, 1.5 Km to the east of the town centre, has 2,000 SS stuying blah blah...' So I contend that Great Malvern should be merged with Malvern, along with any of the informally named suburbs whose page content be absorbed into Malvern, leaving a redirect; and keeping the pages for any that are Civil Parishes. Let's not make a rash decision, the Hills have been around for 700 million years and won't go away just yet, but within the next couple of days, I'll have that draft ready, and then we can compare it with what Gyro is doing.--Kudpung (talk) 18:41, 6 June 2009 (UTC).

Motorways

Deletion reverted.
There is no attempt in the text to pretend that the motorways are 'part of Malvern'. Even a casual reader would understand that the inclusion of motorways is intended to depict Malvern's proximity to them as part of the UK transport infrastructure that significantly affects the Malvern area. Not only is the M50 not part of Malvern as your rightly infer, but neither is the M5 which is also mentioned. Kudpung (talk) 04:10, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

There are already articles on the M50 and M5 and they should not be duplicated in an article on Malvern. Would you add it to all the articles on the all the villages between The Malverns and the Motorways? I do not think that Malvern is in the Proximity of the motorways. Just try and get to the M5 in busy periods. Iccaldwell (talk) 18:50, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

The work is not duplicated. By your reasoning, there would be no mention of the railways either. As in a great many Wikipedia articles, short references and many short excepts are included for quick information, as for example in the case of Malvern Priory in the Great Malvern article. <
You may also have noticed that internal links are provided to the major treatment of the motorways concerned. Whether the motorways are busy or not is subjective POV and not of encyclopedic value. Malvern is close enough to motorways for them to have a mention of Malvern's access to them. If you had lived (and worked) in the region in pre-motorway days, you would appreciate the impact they have, and have had on the area's infrastructure. Imagine the Malverns (and the nearby Birmingham-Black Country-Coventry agglomeration) with today's traffic without them, esp. the impact on places such as Droitwich and Bromsgrove - not to mention access to the capital and its airports.
However, Malvern and its related articles are a work very much in progress , and your observations on duplication, and other suggestions for improvement are most welcome, as there are current discussions on a possible merging of some other Malvern articles because of this. The other Malvern stubs already contain sufficient internal references to the main treatments of Malvern (the town), Malvern (the area), and Malvern (the district). Kudpung (talk) 01:41, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Iccaldwell, the whole Transport section to too long and outside the scope of the page. We should try to reduce it to a single paragraph, briefly stating the transport links available. GyroMagician (talk) 10:08, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I've rewritten the transport section. I've tried to keep it brief, but include the basic transport links. Comments/updates welcome. GyroMagician (talk) 13:01, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I think it looks perfectly adequate now - Thanks :) --Kudpung (talk) 12:04, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Auden

Although I put it in here (because he was listed in Famous People), I'm not so sure that Auden should be mentioned in any of the Malvern articles at all (except Malvern Hills). Unless someone can come up with some fact such as living in the town or or doing something notable there, I think he's probably best left in Colwall, and in his own Wicki article. --Kudpung (talk) 08:41, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Malvern water

There's probably enough in here to split it off into a page of its own, leaving just a brief entry. It certainly has enough notability, and could then probably be expanded just a bit more. What do you all think?--Kudpung (talk)

Malvern Water has been split to its own article: Malvern Water.--Kudpung (talk) 07:14, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Improving

I like what you've done with the intro paragraph. I don't think we need to merge the separate pieces now. We could do with a map, showing how the different Malverns relate. I don't know where the wikipedia maps come from - maybe there is a group that take requests? GyroMagician (talk) 18:24, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I've actually looked into this. Maps are difficult as they are practically all under copyright. I solved this on some of my wine pages by writing to regional wine marketing authorities and asking for permission to reproduce complex maps of overlapping wine regions. It was always granted, but I had to post a copy of the communications in the talk pages to satisfy the WP admins who sometimes tend to delete with their feet. --Kudpung (talk) 19:48, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Excellent idea. I guess MHDC must have a basic map we could ask for permission to use. After a bit of poking around, these guys might be helpful - all we need now is a source map or two. GyroMagician (talk) 21:18, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Population Developement and History

I like the new pop. dev. section - it reads very well. But how about combining it with the history section (which could do with some work)? GyroMagician (talk) 22:31, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Maybe by the time the History section is fully developed, it won't need meging with Pop. What it needs is certinly more info - but there are plenty of reliable sources, it's just a question of getting round to it.

Pop, however, needs some stats or a table t substantiate it, but with all the boundary changes, it'll be difficult to get an objctive profile. Same problem with maps. I've had a mighty poke around at various maps that are bunkered at low levels of the sites of two levels of authorities we are dealing with here:

• Malvern Town Council, and all the other PC of MHD
• Malvern Hills District Council
• Worcs CC.

It's rather complicated, and I'm hoping that by compiling this information, I may be able to learn something, while trying to shed some light on the confusion for anyone hoping to get some explanations from the Wiki. Basicazlly there are six wards of Malvern Town under the malvern Town Council - that's one map. Then there is Great Malvern which is one of the wards (ward 06) of Malvern Hills District, that roughly corresponds not only to the town centre, but to approximately the same area as the Malvern Town Council. Then we have the civil parishes of the Malvern HIlls District, some of which (Malvern Wells) appear to be inside (or partly) the boundaries of some of the other divisions. I tried to sort all this out at the library and the council house last year, but the people there were just as confused as I was. I'll be back in the UK for a couple of weeks soon, and I'll try again if we don't find what we need.

So, the problem with maps is, what exactly do we want a map to represent? --Kudpung (talk) 22:55, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I was picturing a simple map showing the outline of the hills, marking (but not labelling) major roads, showing the approximate location/extent of the various Malverns and Barnards Green. Something to give a quick picture for someone who has never been to Malvern. GyroMagician (talk) 12:08, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Google books just threw me this little gem: A general history of Malvern By John Chambers, 1817. It looks like it might be a useful source for the history section. GyroMagician (talk) 17:16, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Article structure

I'm starting to try this article into line with Wikipedia:UKCITIES. The advice there is pretty helpful. Shall we try to get this up to Wikipedia:GA? GyroMagician (talk) 12:05, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm trying to think of places that should appear in a Landmarks section. So far I have the Hills, St. Annes Well, Priory, gas lamps above Malvern Common, I think there are a couple of listed letter-boxes. Any suggestions? GyroMagician (talk) 14:13, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Here's a goodie and it already wikied: The Theatre of Small Convenience. Little Malvern Priory should be there too. GyroMagician (talk) 16:38, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

I think getting to GA was my main hope anyway, but we're still a long way off. The treatment of the civil parish is now covered by Great Malvern which it is, but the civil parish (officially called Malvern Town) actually extends over a much greater area than just Great Malvern (which has no formal boudary either), but not over all the Malverns which make up the informal area we know as just 'Malvern'. You can certainly suggest or make some some cuts and/or moves to the Malvern, Worcestershire article, because I still think there is stuff in there that is non-town centre specific. Malvern, Worcestershire (this article), is now the general article on the informally defined area of Malvern with all its little bits & pieces that it's supposed to be.
The difficulty arises because (as I have tried to explain in the various articles) that the boundaries of parishes, wards, etc do not always coincide.
One listed letterbox I know of is the Victirian one halfway up the Worcs Rd. on the left hand side between the Link and Link Top a couple of hundred metres up from the station. A photo of it would be a good idea. maybe I(ll make one when I get back to Europe in September. St Annes's well now has a mention, and a link to Malvern Water where I have described it more & included a commons licence photo I found on flikr.
Do go ahead and put short mentions (perhaps copied/modified form their intros) of the LM priory and the Little Theatre - I think it's a good idea, but we now need to watch what is really in the town centre, and in the rest of Malvern, while avoiding having to make a new third article about Malvern Town Parish. Places like the Link & Barnards Green are only informal places but also have their own Wiki pages.
--Kudpung (talk) 11:22, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Gyro, I've compared the two intro versions. They don't differ significantly except that I removed the names of the suburbs because there is the roll-up list of them at the bottom for reference. I was just following your principle that 'less is more'. Don't hesitate to revert it if you prefer. Anyway, I guess there are going to be a lot more changes by the time we have got the right balance of information into the right articles. --Kudpung (talk) 16:35, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Project: Cities

I don't now how that banner got on to this talk page (may be good faith enthusiasm from the city project editors), but Malvern is definitely not a city. I have removed the link, as Wiki guidelines do say that wrong category and/or project links can cause an article to be incorrectly assessed.Kudpung (talk) 15:42, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Merging

Please note that I have grouped all the comments (and my latest one) about merging in to one thread in chronological order. Right up thereat the top of the page↑. (It was my fault for continuing the discussion in the wrong place.)Kudpung (talk) 18:41, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Anonymous edit

Re: 04:10, 10 July 2009 118.175.130.58 (talk) (49,514 bytes) (→Bibliography: additions (Bowden, Weaver)) Please note that this edit was in fact by me, Kudpung. I hasdn't realised the login had timed out before I clicked save. --Kudpung (talk) 01:22, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Summary of recent edits

I've done quite a lot in the past few days, including adding photos, restructuring, pruning, and trying to bring the article in line with MoS (although i'm sure there's a lot to be done there). If you are checking the edit history, please forgive the high number of edits - my satellite Internet connection is so bad due to Monsoon cloud cover that I am unable to apply more than a few Kb of changes at a time.

1. I have removed this passage (included by one of the very early contributors, because I have been unabl to find any references to it. There is evidence to suggest that Elgar composed part of the Enigma Variations in All Saint's, the parish church of Malvern Wells, but his offer of the original manuscript of his oratorio The Apostles, as a gift to the church, was refused by the Anglican church authorities because Elgar was a Roman Catholic and the oratorio was heavily based in that tradition.

2. I have removed this because although I put it in, I don't think it's appropriate here: ...and often used as a national anthem for England,Anthem 4 England - [http://anthem4england.co.uk/modules/news/article.php?storyid=1 Land of Hope and Glory

3. I've removed this list to add it sometime later to a more appropriate article:

• RRE Radar Research Establishment 1953 - 1957
• RRE Royal Radar Establishment 1957 - 1976
• RSRE Royal Signals and Radar Establishment 1976 - 1991
• DRA Defence Research Agency April 1991 - April 1995
• DERA Defence Evaluation & Research Agency April 1995 July 2001
• QinetiQ & DSTL July 2000 - present

I've done just about all I can on this article now, so It's probably time for some reviewing by the other contributors, and some peer review. Maybe together we can get the last fixes done before nominating it for GA.--Kudpung (talk) 10:21, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to slap some {{cn}} templates around, as I feel that the article is a bit low on sources. Jeni ^(talk)_(Jenuk1985) 11:11, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I've added 5 citation requests to the first two sections, both of which are currently completely unreferenced. I won't add any more yet, I'll give everyone a chance to catch up! Jeni ^(talk)_(Jenuk1985) 11:16, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I find there is little to be gained at this stage by searching for citatinos for every turn of phrase. The article is probably too long anyway, and already has 60 or so references. So based on less is more I think removing the deadwood is probably more apt. I've addressed your tags as follows:

• Demise of traditional retail shops in the town centre: rephrased to have no connection with the consequences of supermarkets and retail parks.
• 'Largest hotel' mention deleted (lack of verifiable source), although it is the largest single building in the town.
• Suburbs: it would do the article no service to mention and reference the names of all the farms and manors that have been swallowed up and lent their names to new neigbourhoods, so cutting at this stage is probably better than further expansion.I
• Sharp decline in Malvern popularity as a spa is described in detail in Hembry 1997. - ref added.
  --Kudpung (talk) 12:26, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey, this article has improved a lot since I last read it through. I especially like all the photos. I've just had a another pass over it, making quite a few edits; there's more to do, but it's a start. I removed this paragraph:

From a building that still exists today that housed a radio listening post in Guarlford near TRE South Site, TRE was also instrumental in providing the RAF with the location of Peenemünde, the V2 rocket base in Germany that that was subsequently bombed by the RAF in the World War II Operation Crossbow.

It should maybe go back in, but I couldn't find a way to integrate it, so it's here as a reminder. GyroMagician (talk) 14:04, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Wikiproject Cities

I've re-added the banner for the wiki-project cities. While Malvern certainly isn't a city, it falls within the scope of the project - to quote:

Scope

This WikiProject aims primarily to provide information and a consistent format for cities of the world. "Cities" include municipalities and other civil divisions, including cities, towns, villages, hamlets, townships, unincorporated communities, sections of municipalities, and neighborhoods.

It's a confusing name for the project, but we should be in. GyroMagician (talk) 14:11, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for doing that. I have been meaning to but i forgot. I have had some discussion about it on another page with the people from 'Cities'. Apparently the proj was created across the pond where every settlement is of course called a city. They do admit the name of their proj is a tad confusing, and there is some debate over there as to whether it should be changed. More imortantly, there is a strong consensus that every single settlement should have an entry - with some obvious common sense exceptions (see talk this page further up).--Kudpung (talk) 15:45, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Malvern Town vs Malvern Town Council vs Civil Parish

We may be still unsure about whether Malvern is a a town or a civil parish, or both:
...As a result, a parish council can also be called a town council, a community council, a village council or occasionally a city council ... ...A parish council can become a town council unilaterally, simply by making a resolution to do so. Around 400 parish councils are called town councils,
- from Civil parish#Name .
Personally, after a lot of research, I think the debate is more a question of semantics than of local administration fact.--Kudpung (talk) 15:59, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

It's possible for a civil parish to be a town, for example: Shaw and Crompton and Partington, Greater Manchester. Malvern council describes itself as a town council, which counts as a reliable source that it's a town. It is also described as a civil parish. So as far as I can tell it's both. Nev1 (talk) 16:33, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

(following 2 posts copied from Worcs project talk)

I suspect that the correct name of the parish is actually Great Malvern, though the parish also includes Malvern Link. Malvern Wells and Little Malvern are spearate civil parishes. A town with a "Town Council" is a civil parish, whose parish council has adopted that name. Peterkingiron (talk) 16:23, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The 2001 census lists the parish as "Malvern Town" [1], I'd suggest that's the most accurate source we have? Malvern, Worcestershire probably should be moved to Malvern Town to adequately reflect the name of the civil parish. Though to be honest, I'm still in favour of merging Malvern, Worcestershire into Great Malvern. Jeni ^(talk)_(Jenuk1985) 16:31, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The only time I've ever heard Malvern referred to as Malvern Town is by the football club. I think we aim to conform to common usage on Wikipedia? In that case, 'Malvern, Worcs' is certainly the best title for the page. In common local usage, Malvern refers to the general locality of all the Malverns, plus Barnards Green. As an alternative, we could call the page 'The Malverns', but I think this would be confused with the Hills. No, Malvern is not easily defined as a town, a civil parish, or any other neat demarcation that I know of. But it still exists as an entity in local usage. I think the current structure serves us well, with most information given on this page, and more localised information on Great Malvern, Malvern Link, etc. As I've previously pointed out, if we merge this page into Great Malvern, then Morgan cars won't appear (they'll be on the Link page) and QinetiQ will appear in Barnards Green with the old North Site appearing at Link Top. I don't think that is very satisfactory. To put it another way, when asked where I'm from, I say Malvern, even though it appears that Malvern doesn't exist. GyroMagician (talk) 15:59, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

:Great Malvern has neither official status as a place nor boundaries of its own since it was merged with the former independent Malvern Link Urban District Council in 1900 and became one large town. Moreover, the undefined area of Gt Malvern is cut in two by two parish wards. All official government sources refer to either Malvern, or to Malvern Town Council. In my opinion, this leaves Gt Malvern today as just one of the many neighbourhoods with a name - just like Malvern Link or Poolbrook, for example, but as the place that just happens to include the historical town centre. By contrast however, it is Malvern that has a clearly defined administrated boundary that encompasses its six wards. So if the council by error, ignorance, or omission, don't use the plain word Malvern, neigbourhoods will continue to be referred to by their names in popular culture. Strangely however, nobody much refers to Great Malvern. To the locals, it's just 'up town', or 'in the town', whereas the other areas are almost always refterred to locally by their names, or at least The Link' or 'The Green', and everyone one knows what is meant, and nobody is going to suggest that Malvern Link, Barnards Green (where I also have a house), Link Top, or Poolbrook are in Great Malvern! --Kudpung (talk) 21:36, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Comments before going for GA status

I've only gone through the history section in detail, but as a general comment some sections use bullet points too much. For example, the sports section and the list of places of worship. Prose is preferred to lists, so it would preferably be summarised (the list could be moved into a list of places of worship in Malvern Hills). A few quick points: the external links section needs trimming really, everyone in notbale people needs a reference.

I would suggest that the list deal with a much smaller area. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Early history

• The early and recent history sections should probably be merged into an overall history section with "early" and "recent" as subheadings.
• Given that Malvern was "It has been known as Malferna (11th century.)" was it mentioned in the Domesday Book?
• I know that WP:UKCITIES puts toponomy at the start of the history section, but it isn't necessary and can be counter-intuitive to mention the 11th century and then jump back to the Iron Age. Sale, Greater Manchester, is a successful example where the toponomy can be integrated chronologically.
• MOS:DASH states that in ranges, for example date ranges, ndashes should be used instead of hyphens (ie: 16th–17th century not 16th-17th century). I've sorted out the dashes in this article, but it's worth remembering for other articles.
• "...Edward the Confessor granting the charter..." what charter?
• While I see the merits of explaining the different stories of the priory's foundation, stating what an 18th century document claims or the source Victoria History uses seems to be going a bit beyond the scope of an encyclopedia. What could be done is state something like "It is accepted that Aldwyn was the founder of the priory and the first prior. There are various dates for its foundation, some sources reporting it as 1083 and others as 1085, such as the gravestone of the second prior". The stuff about petitioning the Earl of Gloucester could be moved to immediately after St Wulfstan suggests the founding of a priory.

I have moved the placename material to the top. Since the name is of British origin, this is certainly appropriate. I have aslo added a number of {{cn}} tags, where referneces are needed. Webster, Cornovii deals with Caractacus, placing the battle probably in east Wales. Croft Ambrey and Midsummer Hill were excavated by Stanford, whose published reports should be cited; I am not sure who did Bredon. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

The material on the priory is much too detailed for this article. It might be appropriate in the article on Great Malvern Priory, but even there it would need tidying up. This needs to be done by some one who knows the literature, which I do not. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Recent history

• What about the Dissolution of the Monasteries, did that affect Malvern?
• The first paragraph of recent history could go in governance as it details the history of Malvern's administration. Also, it does need a source.
• When Great Malvern railway station was opened, what line was it a part of?
• "...later Acts empowered the Conservators to acquire land to prevent further encroachment..." what is meant by further encroachment? Of the railways, or hotels, or villas, or what?
• The last part of the final paragraph needs a source

One final thought, as this is all I will be able to do today, could the sections on suburbs and the town centre be merged into a single geography section? There's been some very good work so far, but the article needs to be spruced up a bit before GAC. Nev1 (talk) 16:39, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't dispute for a moment that a lot of work is still needed before going GA. I've addressed some of your points as follows:

• All the people in the Notables section either already have their own articles in Wikipedia, or references are provided if not.

The usual solution is (I think) that notables should be like a disambiguation article. People without an article and not referred to in others (e.g. MP lists) are probably NN, and so should be removed. Adding a name to this list is a variety of spam-edit. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

• I think it would be very difficult to make a prose paragraph out of the list of Places of Worship. Maybe someone who is good at tables could make a table of it. It's an important section, because Malvern has a huge number of churches in relation to its size, because most of them sparang up to cater for the spirtual needs of the 19th century population explosion.
• Dissolution of the monasteries: By the time of the dissolution, Malvern was already an established community of lay people. The people of Malvern actually clubbed together and paid £200 for the church. The abbey buildings were however demolishe, leaving the Abbey gateway as its only vestige. However, i've tried hard not to turn this article too much into an ecclesiastical history. What is needed however, is substantial expansion to the Malvern Priory article - plenty of sources exist.
• History: If I say "it is accepted" someone will place a weasel word tag on it. Weaver & Osborne 2006 makes a 'conclusion'. One dictionary defines conclusion as an intuitive assumption, therefore I would caution any reader of WP or of their book against accepting their evidence as a fait accompli. My conclusion is that legend and facts have been confused over the annals of time and nobody can be really sure. The mention of the different variations of the story are intended to illustrate this. Most important is to establish some kind of date when Malvern as a settlement (staring with the monks) began. I would happily prune all this down if I just knew how.
• History/Governance: moved as suggested, and topic sentence modified to emphasise that Malvern is indeed both a town and a civil parish (see Wikpedia Civil parish).
• Early & Recent History merged under one heading with sub headings as suggested.
• Malvern Station has its own article, I don't think it is really necessary to expand it here.
• Encroachment: the words common land added. The Conservators are responsible for all the common land around Malvern.
• Suburbs & Town centre: One of my earlier drafts (not online) had this as a single section. However, the section was too long, and a distinction needs to be given to enable the 'main' link to the Great Malvern article. I think user GyroMagician will support this too, as he also comes from Malvern and understands the difficulties in writing accurately about the somewhat vague traditional boundaries versus the parish ward boundaries and all the changes they have been subjected to. I have changed this to 'Infrastructure' and made the town centre and suburbs as sub sections, with a 'see also' for the Great Malvern instead of a link to main.
• Toponomy. There is a huge Iron Age earthworks in the Malvern Hills that dates the existence of as settlement in the area since before the Common Era. However, there don't appear to be any recorded names for this. The massive earthworks are some 3/4 miles from the town centre and bear no provable relationship to the later development of the site of the abbey which all medieval reports describe as an almost impenetrable forest. An late 18th century engraving shows the priory Church surrounded by grazing cattle and just three or four houses. I have reorganised the prose into chronological order as you suggested.
  --Kudpung (talk) 10:11, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

CE is an American PC-ism. Use AD and BC in England. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

• Ah, unfortunately the individual articles could change and the reference lost. It's like citing wikipedia, it's not done because realistically it's not a reliable source.
• Fair enough then, turning the list of churches into prose was a bit unrealistic (the best that could be managed is something like "there are xx churches in Malvern).
• Hmm, I see what you mean about not wanting to turn this into an article about the priory, but I think what you mentioned there should go in. It's a nice summary and readers will be wondering what happened to the priory.
• I'm a bit ambivalent about the legends and how best to approach them. I like your approach because it gives the reader all the information, but it still feels like a bit too much for and article not specifically about the priory. I'd be content to leave it as it is though.
• I don't think there's any need to add in much more information about the railway station, just what line it was a part of when it was opened. It would only be a little info that could be tagged onto the end of a sentence.
• Do you mean British Camp? I think it's worth mentioning in the article. It's not directly related to the settlement, but you can say something like "British Camp, a hill fort, provides evidence of activity in the area during the Iron Age". I think it's worth mentioning the medieval castle on the same site as well. Castles are medieval symbols of power and supremacy over the local populace. I'm sure that if it was only 3/4 miles away from Malvern it directly affected the settlement. Nev1 (talk) 10:32, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

As long as I stay alive (10 -20 years?) and a regular Wiki editor, I've kind of made it a personal mission to improve and maintain all the Malvern related articles, so although I might be slower at working on those, I will ensure that the data or links stay updated.
Unfortunately, I can't find a verifiable source for the £200 they paid for the church, it comes from a source that itself has no references.
I'll add the essential info to the station.
Yes, I did indeed mean the British Camp, and I had already inserted it before you replied ;)
BTW: I now see and undertstand what Jenuk has done with the parish template - apologies all round for any misunderstanding - she and I work so quickly that we are often online at the same time but the left hand doesn't always know what the right hand is doing:) . We just need to verify now that the template list complies with mine that was taken very recently from the MHDC web site.
--Kudpung (talk) 11:20, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The template only contains links to existing articles, we shouldn't be adding large quantities of links in a navbox to articles that don't yet exist. The List of civil parishes in Worcestershire article will need quite a bit of work to bring it up to a decent standard. There is still one section I need to tabulise, and it needs sourcing. It may be worth creating redirects from civil parish names to the list article. Jeni ^(talk)_(Jenuk1985) 11:34, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The MHDC list of parishes was up to date with only one red link left - I as working on it last night but havent't posted it yet. By contrast, Wychavon is going to be a headache.--Kudpung (talk) 11:42, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

But it wasn't navigating parish articles, it was still linking village articles, and by virtue of that organisation, it was missing a large proportion of the villages. Jeni ^(talk)_(Jenuk1985) 12:06, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The addition of redlinks to navboxes shows what is missing. This is useful as long as they are not going to stay indefinitely. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

article history

Please note again that edits by 118.175.130.58 are from me, Kudpung. I hadn't realised again that my connection had timed out during the edit.--Kudpung (talk) 11:33, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Econony Section

The economy section currently contains two parts I don't think belong there, but I have no idea where to place. The first is a Three Counties. I think maybe that should appear under culture, but I'm not sure. The second is the Water. It's a small part of the local economy, so probably not notable. Water is mentioned elsewhere in the article (modern history, I think), so maybe we should just delete the paragraph in the Economy section? GyroMagician (talk) 16:10, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Valid points Giro. However, as I see it, agriculture contributes significantly to the town's economy, much of the arable and pasture is in or overlaps into the Malvern parish area, and the 3 Counties showground also boosts the economy, particularly the hospitality industry when something big is going on there. I probably wouldn't entirely delete the water section. It's vital to almost everything Malvern stands for, but you may be right about it not being in the right place. It was clearly the one thing that boosted Malvern's economy and rapid growth in the 19th century, but today it's significance, although important, is more probably a cultural issue - the commercial bottling of the water takes place in Colwall, not in Malvern, nor even in Worcestershire.--Kudpung (talk) 17:02, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Demography

What does this line mean?

Of those aged 16–74 in Malvern, 48.1% had no academic qualifications or at least one GCSE

No, or at least one qualification, sounds like it includes 100% to me! Should that read no, or only one? GyroMagician (talk) 19:51, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Good catch, I've changed it to "... or one GCSE". I usually use a different format for demography sections using different sets of data that aren't available for civil parishes that has "no qualifications" on its own. I must have got confused by the less than crystal clear explanation provided by statistics.gov of what a level 1 qualification is. Nev1 (talk) 20:03, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how you have the patience to plough through those Government stats docs! Makes sense now. Do you think this section would work better as a table, rather than prose? It is really a list of numbers - it might make it easier to absorb? GyroMagician (talk) 07:42, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Early History

Based on a couple of suggestion, I'm suggesting cutting out the legend of Caractacus entirely, just leaving a mention of the Iron Age settlement and the later castle.--Kudpung (talk) 11:16, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that this will almost certainly be found in older local histories. A similar claim is made for the Clent Hills. It is probably better to leave it in (with a citation - when found) and then say that modern scholars (e.g. Webster) do not accept it. Otherwise some one will find the information and add it badly! Peterkingiron (talk) 16:52, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Notable people

The notability of the two or three notable people who don't have Wiki articles is probably supported by the verifiable references provided. Not having a Wiki article is not per se a lack of notability. In fact they are almost certainly candidates for a Wiki article. Perhaps the solution would be to red-link them in anticipation (MOS) that someone will be good enough to create the stubs or complete articles. Something maybe that I could do later when I have more time. There is enough material where I found the original sources. At present I'm making a concentrated effort on another urgent category in Worcs.--Kudpung (talk) 10:34, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Who is Mary Taylor Slow? I'm all for listing scientists, but I'm not sure why she is notable? She may well be important for some reason, but it isn't explained in the article, and doesn't (yet) have her own page. GyroMagician (talk) 09:46, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Having a biography in Wikipedia is not an absolute criteria for notability, as long as references are provided. The lady made significant scientific contributions to the war effort. There is enough material about her to make an article if any one feels inclined. However, if any editors disagree, the entry can be deleted. BTW, there are enough notable people connected with Malvern not listed in this article who have Wiki pages to make a dedicated Wiki list page for people Associated with Malvern.--Kudpung (talk) 06:38, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi Kudpung. I'm not saying she isn't notable, and I certainly don't think a person needs a wiki page before they can be listed. However, if MTS made a significant contribution to the war effort, that fact should be listed and illustrated with at least one example. Lots of people in Malvern know a lot about radio wave propagation and have PhD's - that in itself isn't notable. On reading her gap-biography I've removed her, as she didn't actually work at TRE.GyroMagician (talk) 08:36, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

External links

I've severely pruned this list. Most of them are in the references section anyway (MOS). If any one wants to revert or prune even more, go ahead.--Kudpung (talk) 10:52, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Picture size

Hi Kudpung, I see you've been fixing the picture size to 230px. This looks nice on my laptop, with a relatively small screen, but far too tiny on my desktop with a much larger/higher resolution screen. Isn't it better to leave the size to WikiMedia magic, to automatically guess a sensible size? GyroMagician (talk) 09:44, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

You know, I've been thinking about that and I was already going to ask your advice. I have a large 22" flat screen and use Firefox on Mac, but I just can't figure out the best way to get the pics in the right places and at the right size. Thanks also for your excellent copy editing. I'm mentally preparing myself for my trip to Barnards Green at the end of this month, when I hope to take some better pictures. In the meantime, I think there is nothing stopping us now in going for a GA assessment. The worst that can happen is that if it fails, they will put it on hold for a week for us to do the neccessary tweaks. What do you think?--Kudpung (talk) 11:09, 10 August 2009 (UTC)
BTW: the pics are of course only thumbnails, clicking on them loads the full size images.

Normally images are un-sized, apart from the lead image, so that user-preference can take-over.

Having a quick look at article I would think that you need to add reference detail, such as the publisher which is missing from a number of entries. Reference 21 "Chambers, p.9" is used but no detail of the book given. For GA the lead needs to be expanded to summarise the whole article and the bulleted lists need turning into prose. Keith D (talk) 13:09, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Chambers ref fixed. Intro expanded. Bulleted lists than can be turned into prose have been changed. Others have been removed.

Bulleted lists removed from article

churches

• All Saints Church, (CofE), Wells Road
• All Saints, The Wyche, 1903, 13th-century style. (CofE)
• Christ Church, Great Malvern, 1874, 14th century Gothic style. (CofE)
• Church of the Ascension, Malvern Link. (CofE)
• Holy trinity, North Malvern, 1842, The style is 13th-century Gothic. (CofE)
• Landsdowne Methodist Church, 1886, Great Malvern
• Malvern Baptist Church, Abbey Road
• Malvern Evangelical Church, Pickersleigh Road
• Malvern Hills Life Church, Worcester Road
• Somers Park Avenue Methodist Church
• St Andrew, Poolbrook, 1885, 13th century style. (CofE)
• St James', West Malvern (CofE)
• St Giles Church, (CofE), Wykewane
• St Joseph Church, (RC) Newtown Road
• St Leonard in Newland 1864, 14th century style. (CofE)
• St Mary's Church, (CofE) Sherrards Green (a modern church c1960)
• St Mary the Virgin, 1844, Guarlford, (CofE)
• St Mathias, Malvern Link (CofE) c1896. The church has a set of ten ringing bells. The first full peal (Grandsire Triples) was rung on 1 June 1901
• St Wulstan's R.C. Church Ledbury Road
• Quaker meeting House, Orchard Road
• Wyche Free Church, Jubilee Drive
  --Kudpung (talk) 05:24, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I am creating a new page for places of Worship in Malvern; See: User:Kudpung/Places of worship in Malvern, Worcestershire (draft)
If anyone wants to contribute to it there before it goes live, please don't hesitate.--Kudpung (talk) 05:11, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

primary schools

• Great Malvern Primary School LEA (near Barnards Green)
• Grove Primary School (off Pickersleigh Road)
• Hanley Swan St Gabriel's with St Mary's C of E Primary (Hanley Swan)
• Malvern Hills Primary School LEA (Poolbrook)
• Malvern Parish CofE Primary School (Great Malvern)
• Malvern Wells CofE Primary School (Wells Road, Malvern)
• Malvern Wyche CofE Primary School (Lower Wyche Road)
• Malvern, Northleigh CofE Primary School (North Malvern)
• Somers Park Primary School LEA (Malvern Link)
• St James' CofE Primary School (West Malvern Road)
• St Joseph's Catholic Primary School (Newtown Road - near Link Top)
• St Matthias CofE Primary School (Malvern Link)

--Kudpung (talk) 06:29, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Reference format

Hello All,

I've started updating the reference format to use cite templates (WP:CT). It's a monster task, so if anyone fancies joining in, please feel free. I've made a list of completed sections below - please cross off any sections you complete:

   * Lede 
   * 1 Urban infrastructure
         o 1.1 Town centre
         o 1.2 Suburbs and neighbourhoods
   * 2 History
         o 2.1 Early history
         o 2.2 Recent history
   * 3 Governance
   * 4 Demography
         o 4.1 Population development
   * 5 Economy
   * 6 Culture
      o 6.1 Architecture
      o 6.2 Music 
      o 6.3 Dramatic Arts
            + 6.3.1 Mainstream theatre
            + 6.3.2 Fringe Festival
      o 6.4 Malvern in Literature
      o 6.5 Malvern water
   * 7 Places of worship
   * 8 Health Facilities
   * 9 Transport
      o 9.1 Road
      o 9.2 Rail
         o 9.3 Bus
      o 9.4 Air
   * 10 Education
      o 10.1 High Schools
      o 10.2 Independent Schools
      o 10.3 Further Education
   * 11 Leisure
   * 12 Sport
   * 13 Notable people

I am also considering moving to the ref style now used on the Malvern Water page, placing the actual bulk of the ref at the bottom of the page, and simply using the named reference in the text (thanks WotNow!). I think this style is much clearer. I am also trying to work out how best to handle lots of different refs to the same book, but to different pages. The current style treats each as a new reference, which I find slightly confusing. I don't have a good answer yet though, so if anybody else know a good way to handle this, I'd love to know. Comments? GyroMagician (talk) 14:57, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

You could just use the {{Harvard citation}} style, which just gives the page number and a link to the book details given in a list following the references. Someone has recently converted Wakefield to use this style if you want an example. Keith D (talk) 16:30, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

That looks like what I wanted, thanks! Does anyone mind if I start converting the Malvern article to use the same ref style? GyroMagician (talk) 17:40, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I have begun adding the formatting style which we used in the Malvern Water article. But rather than do the whole article in one hit, I have deliberately done only the references for the first section. The reason is to demonstrate that the reformatting into that style can be done piecemeal, without disrupting the existing text or references.

Regarding the citations for the first section, the Phylis Hembry reference (currently #3) contains multiple citations, and again to demonstrate the ability to do this particular exercise piecemeal, I have deliberately left the very last citation in the previous style

<ref name="bs1815"/>

This demonstrates not only that the exercise can be done piecemeal without pain, but that if something is overlooked, it causes no disruption. However, the beauty of this particular formatting style, is that it simplifies the exercise of checking for errors in both text and references, which itself means better error reduction. For example, after doing this exercise in one article, I found a reference which had gotten lost in the Wikibizzo clutter that was interwoven with the article's text. That particular type of error is highly unlikely in this article, because of there is good editorial diligence (although only by diligence, not by ease of the task). I mention it only as an example of how easy it gets to pick up errors one wasn't aware of (there being two primary types of error: commission and omission, with omission being by definition the hardest to detect).

I will check back in a few hours, and pick up where I, or the next editor, left off.Wotnow (talk) 03:41, 18 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

Have a look at the Harvard citation style Keith D pointed me to. I think this would be perfect for this article - it would probably make sense to convert to that style at the same time as moving the refs to the bottom. GyroMagician (talk) 09:07, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Cheers. I've had a look at that article. Given the time delay regarding visible actions on my part, bit of work-in-progress feedback is in order.

The Harvard citation style adds another layer to the process, my primary aim being to move the lengthy citations out of the body of the text, with the overall aim being a modicum of optimaity in ease of editing, with associated error detection and reduction. However, I don't see the Harvard citation implementation as mutually exclusive with my aim as so far elucidated. Rather, the question is, how can the implementation of the two processes be achieved?

Looking at the example of the Wakefield article, the Harvard style as used to date has selectively inserted inline citation brevity, while leaving other lengthy citations embedded within the article. So as I found it, it neither answered my question, nor demonstrated the editorial optimality as elucidated.

So, after a bit of unsuccessful experimenting with the Malvern article (via the preview function), I've tackled the question from within the Wakefield article itself. I inserted the relevant bits [((reflist|2|refs= ...)) immediately after the "notes" sub-heading, leaving everything else intact. Preview showed this step alone didn't affect the article. Then, I took a couple of the inline citations that had been left within the body of the text, added name=myRefName, gave them an inline citation in the ((r|myRefName)) format, and moved the reference itself out of the body of the text. This worked nicely, and I have saved this result for review.

The article itself reads exactly the same. The only difference is in the ease of editing. And also demonstrated is that where the use of the Harvard style for inline citations has achieved the stated aim of brevity for ease of editing, this can be left as is. That is, the aims are not mutually exclusive, and some variation in the citation approach does not affect the end result.

Having achieved that, namely a piecemeal step which can be reviewed for deconstruction (or reverse engineering) purposes, I am turning my attention again to the Malvern article.Wotnow (talk) 12:13, 18 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

Referencing update

I have now added the basic "notes" and "bibliography" format as exemplified in the Wakefield article. To kick-start the process, so there isn't an empty section to cause confustion, I have taken a simple, one-off citation (Chambers (1817) citation) using an equivalent simple, one-off citation (Holt, 1997) from the Wakefield article. I note by the way that strictly speaking, a bibliography entails listing of all sources used.

Strictly adhered to then, one could end up with lengthy lists containing duplicate information. So the system of listing notes and bibliography separately is probably most optimal in situations where there are multiple citations from the same author, as in the Wakefield article, with the caveat that strictly speaking, all sources should be listed once in the bibliography. The Wakefield article does not currently do this, and it is not unreasonable to ask what would be the point anyway. I was well aware of this conundrum when working on the Captain R.T. Claridge article, but conveniently ignored it until now. Having pondered on it as part of the current exercise, I've changed the section to "Further reading", utilising a trick used by many authors to get around the problem of extensive duplication.

So I think that while we should strive for some sense of perfection, we shouldn't be too surprised if we never quite get it 'right', because there probably is no "right" way that covers all bases - typically the best we can do is seek optimal heuristics. I haven't found any system of knowledge, including referencing, where one nice, simple approach covers all bases. Everything seems subject to John D. Barrow's "Groucho Marx Effect".

Meantime, probably the easiest approach in this article is to work through the references and 'park' them at the bottom as we go. That way, the article reads the same, but the editorial process gets progressively easier, as we refine the references, and declutter the article at the same time. Just some thoughts.Wotnow (talk) 14:56, 18 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

Observations on the referencing project

1. The William Shakespeare article is a better example of how to utilise the "notes" and "bibliography" style, and the sort of context in which it is useful - especially detailed analysis of singular works, with multiple citations thereof. And it lists almost all sources in the bibliography, not a partial listing, which is not a bibliography at all, but better called 'further reading', or 'select bibliography', or something similarly more accurate
2. I think the Wakefield article would be better served by using the style we used in Malvern Water, and which is also used for example, in Richard Dawkins. I note by the way that we did better than the Dawkins article in that regard. We followed the standard heuristic of giving the full citation at first mention, and partial but sufficient citation thereafter (the only 'rule' being that the reader must always be able to figure out the source). The Dawkins article contains examples of multiple full citations of the same work, which is unnecessary.

The Wakefield is fine enough. The referencing is sub-optimal. The article can of course go to the trouble of fleshing out the bibliography, but for the sorts of citations made, it would end up with large portions being duplicate lists. So it would be better off with the style mentioned above. The 'notes' section for example, is not 'notes'. It contains some notes. But it also contains references. And the bibliography is not a bibliography. It is at best a partial bibliography. Why emulate such an approach? If we are to continue the current path, we should look to emulating the Shakespeare article.Wotnow (talk) 08:14, 19 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

I'm getting a bit lost in the differences between these articles. The Dawkins article has the references in the body text, like most other Wikipedia pages - I thought that was something we were trying to move away from? Wakefield uses the Harvard style, keeping references out of the body text, as does Shakespeare. The only difference I can see between Shakespeare and Wakefield in the section names (References/Bibliography vs. References:Notes/Bibliography). I agree that the Shakespeare naming is more consistent with a general academic style, and would prefer to use that. (On looking closer at Wakefield, I see that it is a mixture of traditional inline references and Harvard style. I guess it's a work-in-progress, like everything else around here ;-)

Wotnow - you say I note by the way that strictly speaking, a bibliography entails listing of all sources used. I don't understand - I thought that went without saying. I don't think anyone is suggesting that we do not include some sources in the bibliography. What I am trying to achieve is to separate page references from full references, so that we only include full citation details once, reducing errors and increasing maintainability. 'Further Reading' is a completely different section, used for listing anything not cited in the text, but relevant to the interested reader anyway. We should not mix 'Further Reading' with the bibliography. GyroMagician (talk) 12:17, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Inline citations, editing citations, and referencing layouts

Hi again GyroMagician. A belated response to the above post, which I apologise for overlooking. Firstly, I agree that there is no suggestion of not including some sources in the bibliography, for either the Malvern or Wakefield articles. Rather, what I'm trying to say is that some referencing layouts lend themselves readily to some types of article, but create problems for other articles. As you are probably aware, there are quite a few referencing styles out there, for various reasons. Sometimes it is of course sheer academic competition. But mostly it's because no single style lends itself to every situation, with some referencing styles creating more problems than solutions in some situations.

Using the Dawkins article as an example, I compare it in two ways regarding referencing.

First, references in the text body of articles such as Richard Dawkins. The Malvern Water article, following User:Chienlit's update of Vincenz Priessnitz, shows how to deal effectively with that issue while still retaining a simple referencing style for articles where it is more useful. So the referencing style of the three articles looks the same to a reader, but the crucial difference is that Priessnitz and Malvern Water are more efficient in the behind-the-scenes editing text. And the other difference being that we use the referencing style more efficiently in Malvern Water than in Dawkins, where whole references are repeated several times, when a partial citation with page would not only suffice, but is standard practice (so we get that right in the Malvern Water article).

Regarding inline citations. The inline citation pertains to the numbering within the text, which of course takes the reader to the full citation, just as in a book (except all we have to do now is click a mouse, rather than flick back-and-forth amongst pages while trying to keep track of our reading). How the inline citation is managed in the behind-the-scenes editing text is a separate issue. Whether one uses the Harvard style, or the full reference embedded in the text, or the style adopted by User:Chienlit, the end-result is an inline citation. The differences we're dealing with then, pertain to the layout of the references, and the issue of getting the behind-the-scenes citation out of the body of the text for ease of editing.

On the layout issue, we can compare the Malvern Water and Shakespeare articles as examples. The Shakespeare one seems to exemplify the type of situation where the 'notes' and 'bibliography' separation serves a visible purpose. There is a comprehensive looking bibliography, and the 'notes' section is used in a manner that makes sense: For example, Schoenbaum (1987) is a 384 page book, cited some 40 times, each with specific page notation.

Conversely, if we list a single web-page multiple times, it can look a bit pointless. For such cases, to emulate the 'notes' style, we would perhaps cite the specific paragraph. As you probably know, some legal documents such as contracts, policies, and legislation do this paragraph-by-paragraph blow (which equates to page-by-page), especially if the document is lengthy or complex, or both. This is not what we normally face with a single web page citation.

In the Malvern, Worcestershire article, a website citation where the 'notes' approach can work, is the Malvern Hills citations from the BBC and English Heritage websites. In each case, we cite a page from the website, and can relay this in the citation, which I realised while trying to get the format to work.

But look at a book citation we use. Hembry, Cowie & Cowie (1997). There, the book is cited in a generic sense multiple times. Nothing particularly wrong with that: it's common practice. But using the 'notes' and 'bibliography' style, it starts to look a bit silly listing the same generic reference multiple times, without anything more informative along the way. In such an instance, the "a", "b", "c", etc notations preceding the reference seems neater and more efficient.

By contrast with the Shakespeare article, the Malvern Water article uses only a handful of multiple citations, for which "a", "b", "c", etc for each repeat citation is fine. A reader starting at the first inline citation of say, Poynter (1947) can click to the reference, and either back to where he or she left off in the text, or can click to see where Poynter is next cited. In that case, the reader would find the quote from Breviary of the Eyes. Since the Poynter reference is pay-per-view, the reader is lucky enough that we've found an alternative source that can be read for free (Chambers, 1817, p.140). So the referencing style used in the Malvern Water article serves its purpose very well, and is closer to our purposes than the Shakespeare article.Wotnow (talk) 00:51, 21 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow.

Hello again Wotnow, this article is getting busy! I've just tried the references you've recently been editing - they don't work for me. For e.g. ref no. 9 (Smith, 1978, p3). If I click 9, I am taken to the 'notes' section as expected. However, when I click 'Smith 1978' it doesn't go anywhere. I would expect this to take me to the full details of the Smith book in the bibliography section. Any idea what's wrong? GyroMagician (talk) 12:37, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Hey there GyroMagician. Busy indeed, although much of that is multiple small changes as we figure things out. I confess that the reference links didn't work for me either, but I decided I'd work that out later, if the solution didn't naturally arise meantime from the process. It turns out to be a combination of formatting, and in a couple of cases it was simply typos on my part (Hembry et al is 1997, not 1977; and it's Griffiths & Griffiths, not Griffiths & Joyce). I still have my doubts about the usefulness of this referencing style for this type of article, as compared say to the Shakespeare article, but nevertheless, it will do no harm, and it's an interesting exercise involving a modicum of learning.Wotnow (talk) 11:50, 20 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

I just wanted to let you guys know that what you are doing is absolutely brilliant. Sorry I can't be much help at the moment. --Kudpung (talk) 13:58, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Cheers Kudpung. Good to see the article is beginning to move again.Wotnow (talk) 05:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

Hi Wotnow, First of all, congratulations on sorting out the linking problem in the references - it works like a charm now. I think I am beginning to understand your hesitation in using this style for the page. I think it works very well for Smith (refs 6, 8 and 9). I don't really understand why refs 42-45 don't all appear as the same reference, while Hembrey, Cowie & Cowie (ref 3) do? In the longer term I would hope all book references would include a page number - the original referencing style tended to discourage this, but I think it is reasonable to at least specify a chapter, rather than a whole book. For a simple website though, this style does seem to be overkill. Maybe there is another style out there that would better serve us? I would be happy to have refs appearing as [3,pp27-35] as a way to handle the problem (or something similar), but I don't know a wiki-syntax to achieve this. Anyway, I have a tree to decorate. Happy Christmas All! GyroMagician (talk) 16:57, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Cheers GyroMagician. I tried to elaborate my thoughts in my response above, which you may have read. I've just given it a heading to reflect what I think are the main points being made, and make it easier to navigate our dialogue.

I initially kept the changes to one multiple general citation (Hembrey, Cowie & Cowie) to illustrate the solution, and to make it easier for others to review. That way there's only a few changes to check, with everything after that being the repeats of the same technique.

I was also worried that I might be inadvertently creating discouragement and stalling the momentum. So by finding a solution, and making an illustrative change, I could step back and see what others thought. I've now amended the other refs.

I agree that for simple website citations, the style can seem like overkill. And indeed I guess for simple citations of any sort. I don't see any simple solutions for all occasions. Only picking the most suitable compromise for any given context. The exercise did at least provide a reminder that in some instances, a given web-page is just that: a page. So it can be cited as a page on a larger website. Obvious on reflection, but easily overlooked.

Regarding book citations, while it can be useful to cite specific pages and/or chapters, which I myself try to do whenever practical, I don't see this as critical, as long as the information provided is sufficient for someone to track down the source.Wotnow (talk) 05:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)Wotnow

Town or not a town? That was the question...

As I have nominated this article for GA, and as I want to put any outstanding matters to bed, I've been concerned for months about an opinion expressed early on in the process, that Malvern is not a town, and that Great Malvern is. Rather than invite an edit war, I acquiesced and changed the intro to be vague to appeal to all school of opinion. However, my summer meeting with the town clerk, and subsequent research of government bills and acts concerning civil parishes and town councils has now provided undeniable proof that Malvern, and not Great Malvern, is a town, and is indeed the town. In order to substantiate this, I have now reworded the intro again, and provided references to the government sources that clearly show that Malvern is indeed a town. The article already shows that its various wards cover the majority (but not all) of the suburbs known collectively as The Malverns.--Kudpung (talk) 14:21, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Notable people

Julius Harrison is no longer a red link, I have created the article. if anyone would like to proofread/copyedit it, it would be much appreciated. Thanks.--Kudpung (talk) 03:02, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Referencing - finishing off

WotNow and I have now almost finished with the references. There are a few that are still giving me trouble:

<ref name=Demographicstats2006>Demographic research statistics (2006) by Vivid Interface Ltd</ref>

I don't know what is - some sort of report? Does anyone have any details?

<ref name=GuilfordsRegister1283>Bishop Guilford's Register of 1283,(WRO, x713.093 BA 2648).</ref>

I'm guessing this is a book, but I have no idea how to interpret the (WRO, x713.093 BA 2648) part.

<ref name=Organbuilding>{{Cite web
  | title = Organ building
  | url = http://malvern.whub.org.uk/home/mhcindex/mhc-businit/mhc-businit-experience/mhc-businit-nicholson.htm
  | accessdate = 20 May 2009}}
</ref>

This one is dead. I can't find another reference citing organs outside of the UK - Nicholsons own website lists several organs at sites inside the UK (see portfolio). Once these are fixed, I think we're done. GyroMagician (talk) 13:15, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

As I mentioned earlier, the official Malvern local government site has been given a complete makeover for 210, which has resulted in the loss of many of the pages that were referred to when I wrote the bulk of the article. Dunno what to do about that.
Found the ref I was looking for for the amalgamation of Malvern and the Malvern Link Urban districs. Will be posting it shortly.--Kudpung (talk) 14:21, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Gyro: I'm guessing this is a book, but I have no idea how to interpret the (WRO, x713.093 BA 2648) part. - it's not a book. WRO is Worcestershire Records Office, the rest is the archive/document number. Obviously not all sources are available online - although a lot of people re beginning to imagine they are ;) --Kudpung (talk) 15:43, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Over-referencing

I know Wikipedia is all about verifiable facts, but I think this article is becoming over-referenced. Have a look at the first paragraph: 2 refs that Malvern is a town, 2 to say that Malvern is governed by Malvern town Council, and 4 for the merger of Malvern Link. Can we all try to be a bit more selective - if you have a choice of several refs, put in the most relevant/helpful one, two at most. If you find a better ref, there is nothing wrong with replacing the original, rather than just adding an extra one. Remember, there are no extra points for having lots of refs - only for being clear and concise. GyroMagician (talk) 17:25, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

That's my fault - there have been issues in the past (without edit wars) where some contributors have strongly contended that these things were not factual in spite of the referenced facts, so I tend to go OTT when I find additional references that prove the facts over and over again. However, I wholeheartedly agree that the object is not to reference every single sentence in a Wikipedia article, and I already cut down on the five castle refs. I'll select what I think is/are the best, and hope that every one agree with my choice :)--Kudpung (talk) 18:53, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

I've removed a bunch of superfluous refs, but now there are a lot of red warnings shown on the page. I sure don't know how to fix that - usually when I remove an inline ref, it's gone. Can somebody do a quick fix please.--Kudpung (talk) 19:20, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

It looks as if I've figured out how to remove them.--Kudpung (talk) 19:41, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

I think we all get a bit carried away with the 'hunt'. It looks much better now though, thanks. GyroMagician (talk) 20:39, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes - sorry about about the edit conflicts. Shows how keen we all are (three authors in three different time zones) to get all the fixes done :) I've since had a look at the Malvern water article's refs and I guess I'll slowly come round to your way of thinking. Just gimme time!--Kudpung (talk) 03:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Consensus

Can we soon reach a consensus as to whether we consider the article ready to ask Dana to have another look?--Kudpung (talk) 18:53, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

• I think it's as ready as it'll ever be - I'm done for now. GyroMagician (talk) 20:40, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
• Agree. I can't find anything else that needs doing, although of course, all WP articles are always a work in progress.--Kudpung (talk) 03:19, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
• Concur I've done some detailed review up to about the Governance section, by which time I was being continually distracted. So apart from adding a citation for employment demographics, I've only skimmed the remainder of the article. However, others have been through those sections in more detail, so I would agree with flagging Dana.Wotnow (talk) 08:05, 6 January 2010 (UTC)Wotnow

Referencing Howto

The referencing syntax used is this article has changed. The new format attempts to keep the reference detail out of the body text, making it more readable while you edit. That's the idea, at least.

So how does it work? It's quite simple. In the body text (i.e. where you want the reference number to appear), add
{{r|myRefName}}
where myRefName is any name you want to use for your reference. It doesn't appear anywhere on the finished page, it's only a name. You can add any number of these, if you want to refer to the same reference multiple times. Then at the bottom of the page, in the reference list, add the following:

<ref name="myRefName">{{cite STANDARD CITE TEMPLATE}}</ref>

where STANDARD CITE TEMPLATE is any of these. Cite templates are much more detailed than simple ref tags, and encourage better reference keeping.

Have a look at the article source to see some examples of how it works. Remember, this is Wikipedia, so don't worry about breaking things - someone will fix it quickly if you do. But if you're still not happy, just add an old-style

<ref>[My reference]</ref>

and we'll convert it to the new form. But give it a try - you might like it :-)

Finally, thanks to Wotnow for introducing me to this markup style, and for converting a large part of this page! GyroMagician (talk) 20:26, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Opening Paragraph

Going back in time, to before my first edit on the article (I think - May 2009), the opening paragraph used to read:

Malvern is a town and civil parish in Worcestershire, England. It includes the settlements of Great Malvern, Barnards Green, Malvern Link (with Link Top), Malvern Wells, West Malvern, Little Malvern and North Malvern. Most of these settlements are separated by tracts of open common land. The civil parish has a population of 28,749 (2001 census). Great Malvern on the eastern flank of the Malvern Hills is considered the centre.

I think this is actually much clearer, and more recognisable to me as a description of Malvern, than what we currently have. It captures that Malvern is actually a group of places, most with Malvern in their name, while being very simple. The opening paragraph is meant to give a flavour, rather than lots of fine detail. It should be possible to read only the first paragraph, close the page, and know something about the page topic. Before I revert it, and because I don't really follow the differences between urban areas, parishes, towns, etc., I thought I would start a discussion. The details of Malvern Link merging with...whatever it merged with...certainly belong in the Governance section. Could somebody reword the above to make it accurate, but keep the simple spirit?

While I'm here, how would anyone feel about renaming 'Town Centre' to 'Great Malvern'? It seems more accurate. Not doing so would seem to be trying to fit the town into a mould, rather than describing it as-is. GyroMagician (talk) 18:10, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I have avoided getting much involved in this, because I live at the other end of the county and am not fully familiar with the area. However this paragraph appears to be inaccurate, since several of the places named are distinct civil parishes. I would suggest that the article should concentrate on the area for which the town council is responsible. However the lead might say that

• the town extends along the side of the Malvern Hills, so that settlements of Malvern Wells, West Malvern, (etc) are contiguous. OR
• Malvern is a town in Worcestershire ... Most of the town is in the civil parish of Malvern (which has a town council), including North Malvern and Malvern Link, but the town extends into the adjoining parishes of Malvern Wells, West Malvern, and Little Malvern. This article is mainly concerned only with the civil parish of Malvern.

I would suggest something along the lines of the latter, unless this is intended to become a paretn article to those for the otehr parishes. You might say that the Town centre is at [or in] Great Malvern. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:57, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Although I obviously don't claim ownership to this article, I have gone to extreme lengths to word that intro as carefully as possible, and mainly just to prove to one particular editor, while avoiding edit war and WP:CIVIL, what Malvern is all about- and precisely to clarify the fact that Malvern is NOT a collection of towns, that Malvern IS a town, that former villages and towns have been absorbed into the civil parish of Malvern, and that the civil parish of Malvern is large enough to be sub divided into wards. An intro is expected to cover the main ponts of an article, almost as a short stand-alone article in its own right; Malvern is a relatively long article and therefore its intro is designed to cover this requirement. Any further changes that are clearly improvements and that will not compromise the article's GA status if it passes, can probably best be done later, with more debate, and with less sense of urgency. Finally, the article is under the final stages of a GA review, we only have one shot at this, and we have been asked to stop any edits other than minor technical issues until the articl has either passed or failed. Please see Talk:Malvern, Worcestershire/GA1, there a re only two issues to be addressed and I am working onthem now, and they don't concern the intro.--Kudpung (talk) 00:19, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

At the risk of ruffling the reviewer's feathers, because she wants to get this finished with a minimum of disruption, I have slightly reworded the intro to incorporate some of Peter's suggestions. The example he cited was still not entirely accurate (civil parishes vs. suburbs/settlements), and also contained weasel words, which was oneof the reasons I originally changed it. IMHO, the lead section now has a perfect length and scope (WP:LEAD) to match the article.--Kudpung (talk) 03:02, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Okay, Kudpung has convinced me this is not the right time to start rehashing the intro. Let's see the outcome of the GA review - I'll stop editing until that's done. GyroMagician (talk) 15:09, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

I have added a capnote pointing to the dabpage (though I am not sure I have got it quite perfect). I have added the other places (and more) to the dabpage Malvern. Some one might like to check I have got this right. I think the lead is now best left alone. Peterkingiron (talk) 21:46, 11 January 2010 (UTC)