Talk:Whitehall Building

Anyone know if either of these two "Whitehall" buildings (the annex or the original) are the same "Whitehall Street" building that once contained the Manhattan Selective Service Induction Center that Arlo Guthrie so memorably described in his landmark "Alice's Restaurant Massacre" monologue (y'know, the place in NYC where you'd go to be "injected, inspected, neglected, rejected and selected" (or some such rhyming sequence) ?? [signed] Florida Bryan — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.99.22.25 (talk) 17:01, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 22:02, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

Whitehall Building (right) and its annex (left)

• ... that the Whitehall Building Annex (pictured) was said to be "one of the largest commercial structures in the world" at the time of its completion? Source: NYCL p. 4
  • ALT1:... that the Whitehall Building (pictured) was developed by a company headed by the inventor of Vaseline? Source: NYCL p. 2

• Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/The Goes Wrong Show
• Comment: I broke my computer screen, unfortunately, so it may take me a while to respond.

Created by Epicgenius (talk). Self-nominated at 23:47, 20 February 2020 (UTC).

• Date and length fine (I admit when I first saw this thought the phone number was Whitehall 1212 and had images of stuffy government officials!). Hooks cited inline, though I prefer the vaseline hook. QPQ done, no close paraphrasing. Picture licence fine. Good to go. The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 18:23, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Whitehall Building/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Tayi Arajakate (talk · contribs) 02:43, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• Hello epicgenius, I'll be the one to review this article and will be posting further comments in a short while. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 02:43, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

• As of currently, I've not touched the sections on history and critical reception yet, but from what I have gathered the article has a number of minor issues and could do well with a bit of polishing. I'll be adding further comments as I go through the rest of the article in some time. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 11:27, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

  epicgenius, pinging, since I've gone through the article now and am putting it on hold for the time being. I'll go through it again once the issues are cleared up or clarified upon. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 11:53, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

  Tayi Arajakate, thanks for your review. I've responded to all these issues now. epicgenius (talk) 16:56, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

  Epicgenius, I did a quick re-checking of the article. Everything looks in order now with the exception of the one issue that I have mentioned in the comments. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 03:01, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Assessment

1. Comprehension: The article is well written.
Pass

Criteria	Notes	Result
(a) (prose)	Some issues could be found, listed in comments below. (update) Resolved.	Pass
(b) (MoS)	The layout of the article is in accordance with the manual of style.	Pass

2. Verifiability: No issues with verifiability are to be found anymore.
Pass

Criteria	Notes	Result
(a) (references)	The list of references is present in accordance with layout guidelines.	Pass
(b) (citations to reliable sources)	Sources provided for inline citations are reliable and in adherence with guidelines	Pass
(c) (original research)	Some issues could be found, listed in comments below. (update) Resolved.	Pass
(d) (copyvio and plagiarism)	No copyright issues were found.	Pass

3. Comprehensiveness: The article is comprehensive and gaps in its major aspects have been filled.
Pass

Criteria	Notes	Result
(a) (major aspects)	Some issues could be found, listed in comments below. (update) Resolved.	Pass
(b) (focused)	One potential issue could be found, listed in comments below. Otherwise, the article is focused and on topic.	Pass

4. Neutrality: The article is complaint with the policy on neutral point of view.
Pass

Notes	Result
The article adheres to a neutral point of view, one possible issue located which is listed in the comments below. (update) Resolved.	Pass

5. Stability: The article is stable.
Pass

Notes	Result
No issues regarding article stability can be located.	Pass

6. Illustration: The article is well illustrated with relevant media.
Pass

Criteria	Notes	Result
(a) (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales)	No copyright issues could be found, images are tagged with their copyright statuses.	Pass
(b) (appropriate use with suitable captions)	Use of images and their captions are appropriate.	Pass

7. Overall: Close to a good article but some polishing is required so putting on hold for the time being.
   (update) More or less a good article, just waiting for a remaining issue to be resolved. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 03:06, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
   (update) The article is good now. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 04:08, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
Pass

Comment

• Issues with prose

• As someone who doesn't understand how landfills work, the following line, "the land under the Whitehall Building was not filled until 1835, when debris from the Great Fire of New York was dumped there" could be interpreted as the debris being used to create the land instead of the land being created for dumping the debris.

• Actually, your first assumption is correct. The fill was actually used to create the land. epicgenius (talk) 16:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

• The following line, "on Battery Place the original structure is composed of 12 vertical bays" is a bit confusing. Could mention that it concerns the facade facing battery place or the facade facing south.
  •  Fixed
• "The elevator lobby is the same height as the annex", this should be elevator bay or elevator lobbies, no? The citation page number for the line should also be 5–6.
  •  Done
• The conversions of imperial barrels and short tons to various units seem unnecessary, long tons and imperial gallons can be removed at least.
  •  Done
• The sectioning under History can be better stylised by ownership rather than "Construction" and "Use" since there is a bit of overlap.
  •  Done
• Could mention that the Century Realty Company was also founded by Chesebrough.
  •  Done
• The following line "In 1999 the Moinian Group paid $42 million for the basement, ground floor, and the 14th through 31st floors of the older two buildings." could state 14th to the topmost floor, since the original building ends at the 20th floor.
  •  Done
• The last line of Critical reception needs an ending quote.
  •  Done

• Issues with original research

• The lead states the following, "the annex was built in 1908–1910 due to high demand for space in the original building" but the high demand is not mentioned anywhere in the body other than the bit about the original building becoming occupied so a bit unclear where this is being sourced from. On the same note, the line stating "rents per square foot at the Whitehall Building were generally lower than those on Broadway, and so the building soon became fully occupied" is cited to the Land Commission report which states that the rents were cheaper therefore it became a commercial success but not that it became fully occupied. Correct me if I'm mistaken on this, otherwise the portions needs reworking or needs to be supported with other references.
  •  Fixed It has been a while since I've worked on this. epicgenius (talk) 16:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
• The following line under the section on Site states, "adjacent to the Downtown Athletic Club building at 18–20 West Street to the north" which refers to its adjacent building doesn't seem to be verifiable from the NYCity Map site, it gives the address of 20 West Street for that building.
  •  Removed Although this source does give the Downtown Athletic Club as being at 18-20 West Street, it may not be necessary for the purpose of this article. epicgenius (talk) 16:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
• The last segment under the section on Site states, "their former lands were combined to build larger commercial buildings", although intuitive, the Landmark Commission on Whitehall Building doesn't state that they were combined.
  •  Removed
• Minor, but the source cited for the following line, "the newest addition was originally called One Western Union International Plaza because Western Union employees worked there" doesn't mention anything in relation to Battery Place or Whitehall building, the citation in the next line however identifies it as 17 Battery Place North so would suggest citing it to this line as an additional reference.
  •  Done

• Issues with comprehensiveness

• The lead should also include its alternative name, 17 Battery Place. The address for both the annex and the original building is the same by the way.
  •  Done
• The line, "as a result of the land filling, neighboring buildings such as 21 West Street were constructed without a basement" seems a bit off topic.
  •  Removed
• The neo-Rennasiance or Renaissance Revival style needs a mention in the section concerning design.
  •  Done
• Could possibly include information regarding the facade on the sides of the two buildings.
  •  Done
• The annex had another earlier name called Whitehall Extension which isn't mentioned.
  •  Done
• History doesn't mention the transition of ownership from United States Realty to Whitehall Improvement Company.
  •  Done I mentioned when US Realty sold the building. I can't find when Whitehall Improvement got the building, but it was sometime before 1939. epicgenius (talk) 16:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
• Bit unclear what happened to the Moinan Group's ownership in the original building. Also unclear if the upper floors were converted into the proposed Ocean rental-apartment.
  •  Done It was completed in 2001, but 9/11 set renting back a little. It wasn't actually called the Ocean by the time the project was done, it was just called 17 Battery Place. epicgenius (talk) 16:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

    Epicgenius, the Moinan Group's ownership of the upper floors in the original building is still unaccounted for. Since in the next paragraph it says SL Green sold the building to an unnamed buyer. Also the last line of history should specify that Moinan Group intends to convert 2 Washington Street into a residential structure. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 03:00, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

    Tayi Arajakate, thanks. I have done both now. epicgenius (talk) 04:03, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

    Epicgenius, that clears it up a lot. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 04:06, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

    In other words, congratulations! You have helped develop another good article. Tayi Arajakate _Talk 04:07, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

• Issue with neutrality

• Nothing major, but regarding the bombing incident. The news report suggests that the there was bombing on both the German consulate and a smaller bombing on the office of a paper called the Communist Daily Worker, among which the latter is omitted. Seems like a interesting tidbit that can be added.
  •  Added