Talk:List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state

Split this into different pages per state

Although not nearly as numerous as the National Register of Historic Places, I think this list might be better served by splitting it up into fifty articles, one per state. Any objections? howcheng {chat} 22:36, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Excellent idea, just make sure they are indexed in a list and categorised. SP-KP 22:38, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

The list is FAR from complete. I have added many items, and suppose many others are missing. Here's the official list: http://www.cr.nps.gov/nhl/designations/Lists/NY01.pdf The danger of such lists is that when something is left off, it may imply that it is NOT a National Historic Landmark. Phmalo 01:37, 12 December 2006 (UTC) 12/11/06

California Section: Cathedral of St. Joseph, San Jose

I have removed Cathedral Basilica of St. Joseph (San Jose) from the list of National Historic Landmarks, California section. Here's what I wrote on the cathedral's Wikipedia article discussion page:

I have searched the National Park Service web site, and though I can find the Cathedral listed on the National Register of Historic Places, it is not included on the NPS's list of National Historic Landmarks (every National Historic Landmark is included on the National Register of Historic Places, but not every place on the register is a designated historic landmark.) I know that the Cathedral website says that the place is a National Historic Landmark, but I think their webmaster might have misunderstood the NPS's designation. I'm removing from the article the WP category of National Historic Landmark. If somebody has more up-to-date information indicating that the designation is correct, they can restore it.

Whyaduck 15:18, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Reformat / expansion - Opinions on format, please

I have begun an large effort to complete this list, review all the links, add illustrative images, tie to references, and standardize the formatting for the whole list. As if that wasn't enough to bite off, I'm thinking that this list will benefit from having short descriptions added for each landmark. Down the road, this list will grow too large for a single article, and I think it will need to be split into separate articles for each state (as suggested above), or at least separate articles for regional sets of states. Any participation is, of course, welcome - especially on the descriptions.

Here's what I really want:
Some opinions, please. I've worked up a few options for formats, which can be found at User:Ipoellet/Sandbox 1. They each have their plusses and minuses. And I've noticed that the width of the monitor I'm using makes a difference. (For example, the text-oriented option works better on narrow-screen monitors, but the tables start looking cramped.) Which of these will work best? What mods may be needed?

Some principles I've used:

1. The main name of each NHL matches as closely as possible the name at: National Park Service (April 2007), National Historic Landmarks Survey: List of National Historic Landmarks by State (PDF){{citation}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link).
2. Unless otherwise referenced via footnote, the descriptions are based on: National Park Service. "National Historic Landmark Program: NHL Database". {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help).
3. The descriptions are written to be as Wikilink-rich as possible.
4. Can't have an image for each NHL, so they are selected to reflect the range of NHLs in the state. Usually no more than 4-5 images per state.

So, please, have a look at User:Ipoellet/Sandbox 1, give any suggestions, and help me out of my indecision!

-Ipoellet 02:07, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

How about option 2c? That is, a sortable table, with a spot for the picture as part of the table. The sortability option looks very useful, and pics are great to have, but would only work if included in the table itself. My thoughts, for what they're worth. :) -Ebyabe 00:26, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Y'know, I've thought of that, and I'll think on it some more. But I ran into 3 problems: a) even on a widescreen monitor, adding a column will make the table very crowded, b) there are pictures available for only a minority of the NHLs - 'bout a third is my guesstimate, and c) including even that reduced number of thumbs on a page will make it take quite a while to load. So I've conceived the use of pictures as a general illustration for the state, rather than illustrations for the individual landmarks. But there may be ways around these issues, so I'll ponder some more. Ipoellet 17:23, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

I've actually created an option 2c now. After working on it and looking at it, I will withdraw the first two reservations I stated above. The crowding wasn't that bad, and the blanks in the picture column aren't as irritating as I feared. The third reservation, about time to load, is still there. But I'm thinking it's a risk worth taking. So, I'll play with the format on a couple more states, but right now I'm definitely leaning toward 2c. Further opinions still welcome. Ipoellet 03:59, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I do have a good idea occasionally, doncha know. :) You can always squinch down the thumbnail sizes, they're there more for reference. People can always click on them to get the full version. Wasn't sure about the picture placement. Maybe b/c on most lists, the pics are all aligned on the right side of the page. That is another possible option; making them be in the rightmost column. Though having them in the column next to the lankmark name, like now, works fine. Other than possible tweaking, I think you've got it, mate. :) -Ebyabe 19:19, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Cool beans. I'm working on the "Description" column for a couple more states, but once I've gotten that to a certain point (I'm not filling that in for every single landmark without other editors' help - that would take forever), I'll move Tennessee, Utah, and 3 more into production. Thanks for the help! I'm starting to think featured list here.

And, BTW, I'll never accept that other people have good ideas unless they're pompous, persnickity, self-satisfied, stuffed shirts like me.  ;-)

Ipoellet 20:07, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Ooh when did we get sorting in tables? That's sweet! 2c for sure. howcheng {chat} 20:19, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I've moved DC, Hawaii, Oregon, Tennessee, and Utah into production. Ipoellet 19:43, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

All the states

At this sandbox is a dump of all the states in table format, from the NRIS database in January. I included additional information to help encourage site visits and stub creation, but can remove what you don't want. But I need new column headings for format 2c if you want additional data. Some columns could have info on two lines (such as Locality<BR>Address), although the first piece would have to be what would be sorted for the column. Because the columns are sortable, I can also wikilink all the county names rather than just the first one. The TOC is wrong because the database has a few non-state things as states and I haven't run through the 50-item checklist. The article is too large so formatting fails partway through, but it will be chopped up anyway. Let me know what you want. (SEWilco 05:12, 21 August 2007 (UTC))

Wow. That's just. . . Wow. I'll have to look this over more closely, but it clearly offers some improvements over the purely manual approach I've been using. Thank you!

The first thing I noticed is that this data pull from the NRIS database includes several listings that are not included in either of the sources I've been using so far ([1] and [2]). I'm wondering if what we've got is incorrect records in NRIS, or incorrect omissions from my two sources. . ? -Ipoellet 16:17, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

The list changes, but this should provide a starting point for some stubs. For new items, you might check the Address field in my list. If my list has an empty address then in the database the address is blank, unknown, or restricted. It is possible that the online NHL list is unable to match some such locations with your searches. Or maybe the location of an object (a ship?) changed. (SEWilco 18:29, 21 August 2007 (UTC))

If you can define the desired format, I can correct the list's format. Then people looking at individual states can help check and edit. I didn't include all the info in the database because someone creating a stub will probably access the NPS sites directly. I also have the NRIS property ID in an HTML comment, but can make that visible if you define where it should be shown (but there does not seem to be a way to search the NPS sites with that ID). (SEWilco 18:40, 21 August 2007 (UTC))

There seems to be a piece of data indicating which culture the site is significant to. Should I include that column? We could then invite relevant Category:Culture WikiProjects to help fill in details. (SEWilco 02:55, 23 August 2007 (UTC))

Is it really necessary to specify the percentages for the columns, or can the browser be allowed to make things fit? Also, for the date column, the word "listed" might help make the column narrower. (SEWilco 00:23, 22 August 2007 (UTC))

I found the percentages necessary because I was thinking to have multiple states in a single article - therefore multiple tables that had to be congruent. That wouldn't be necessary it each state becomes its own article, though I'm still thinking about "regional" articles with multiple states (e.g. Pacific Northwest with 3 or 4, Midwest with 7 or so, etc.). Thoughts?

That data field around culture sounds interesting, but I'm not familiar with it and I'm wondering what it means. Can you provide a couple examples?

Here's the format I've been using:

1. Column 1 - The name of the site, formatted bold and linked. In external sources, names are sometimes inverted and sometimes not (Wilson, Woodrow, vs. Woodrow Wilson; Arizona, USS, vs. USS Arizona). If there's an option, the inverted form is preferred so that the alphabetical sorting works right.
2. Column 2 - The default contents of the image column is "<span style="color: #fcfcfc">image pending". This allows the column to sort by whether an image has been included or not. (If an image is included, the standard image width is 100 pixels.)
3. Column 3 - The year of listing - I have excluded the month and day because I feel they are unnecessary and distracting. I have not been linking the year, but I have no strong preference on that issue as long as we're consistent throughout the list(s). (BTW, "Year listed" vs. "Year of designation" is a very good rewording to narrow that column. Thanks!)
4. Column 4 - The "Locality" is your "City" column. Same info, different label. Format is the city name, linked, with the state part of the link not displayed. I have been linking every occurrence of a particular city to keep the link convenient when the list is sorted and re-sorted according to different columns.
5. Column 5 - The county column is exactly as you've been doing it, only with every occurrence linked. (Of course, this is modified for states that don't have counties or where another division is more informative - LA, AK, DC, HI, the territories.)
6. Column 6 - Until a description is written for this list, I've just been putting in an external link to the landmark's specific page at the NPS's "Search for an NHL" site. But I doubt that link is in the NRIS, so we'll have to add it manually.

The acreage and coordinates are excellent bits of information, but I believe they belong in each landmark's individual article, rather than in the list. The list format is useful for displaying information that can be easily compared between the different records. The coordinates can't - not really human readable without following a couple links. And I don't trust the people who populated the NRIS to have used consistent definitions when measuring acreage at different landmarks - the information may not be truly comparable from one row to the next. (For one example, all the ships seem to be listed as either 1 acre or 9, with no particular rhyme or reason.)

Thanks again! This data pull will be great!! Ipoellet 21:01, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Having all those images are slowing down the page, a page that would be big enough just with the whole list sans images.--Bedford 02:50, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

We're talking about supplying a summary for all the states, not keeping the summary together in a single article. If everything does fit in a single article, fine. If too much detail exists, the individual states will be split off or the format will be changed. (SEWilco 02:58, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

Agreed. The main list is approaching its size limit - hard to navigate and taking too long to load. It will have to be broken down into multiple lists, à la List of National Register of Historic Places entries. Ipoellet 03:28, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

The full list is over 700 KB. It's not going to be in a single article. (SEWilco 04:19, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

I put the coordinates on a second line under Locality, where they should tend to fit due to the multiple line summaries. (SEWilco 04:35, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

You convinced me about the coordinates with your explanation at "NHL viewing, here. Question: List of Minnesota state parks makes use of the name= parameter, and the park names don't show up when I go to Google Maps. But the waypoint names do appear with the example on Template:kml. How did they manage it? Ipoellet 04:41, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

The template example is using a slightly different incantation and the coord template should be fixed soon to emit those location name labels. The location names are in the data I'm preparing. Tsk, that silly globe is making the coords a tad wide. (SEWilco 05:16, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

Updated list is at this sandbox. You might want to copy chunks to some workspaces for people to people to work with, along with work instructions (copy out the part you work on and delete it from the workspace after modified article was saved?). Wikipedia times out when saving the large article. (SEWilco 05:36, 25 August 2007 (UTC))

I put the updated list in the workspace Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/NHL coords. I moved the Arkansas info to List of National Historic Landmarks in Arkansas. I then replaced the Arkansas data in /NHL_coords with a link to the article. (SEWilco 22:23, 28 August 2007 (UTC))

As discussed on the talkpage for List of National Historic Landmarks in Arkansas, the table included more NHLs than exist for the state. It included separate entries for multiple NRHPs that are part of one NHL. And it was missing 3 NHLs. And the column of dates added is NRHP add date, not NHL date which would be more relevant (but is not available in your source data probably). However, it was a big help to have the table put in. It was somewhat difficult to fix it up to conform to the NPS list of NHLs, but not too bad. I replaced the column of date adds with the correct NHL dates, after creating an article including NHL designated date for each site on the list. At the time, I didn't understand where the list came from. Thanks for setting it up. Will be easier to edit the results for other states, now understanding that there may be NRHPs that are not NHLs but rather are parts of NHLs, and that some NHLs may be missing. doncram 21:58, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Also moved Vermont's list. (SEWilco 16:12, 28 September 2007 (UTC))

I moved Arizona's list, and notice that it also includes multiple NRHPs that are part of one NHL, the Mary Jane Colter Buildings, and will have to be consolidated. Will proceed with editing it. doncram 21:58, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

SEWilco- Couple of questions: What was the date of your data pull from the NRIS? And, just to confirm, the coordinates came from the NRIS, too? -Ipoellet 03:04, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I got the files in mid-August, but some of the files had January dates. The coordinates came from two dumps, an NRIS dump and gaps filled in from an NRHP location dump in a nearby directory. The location files had things like shapefiles, but I only used one or two files with NRHP filing numbers and single-point geo coordinates. Coordinates were only used for entries which were in the NRIS dump. (SEWilco 03:21, 27 September 2007 (UTC))

Appendix C

I'm rather befuddled by Appendix C of the National Park Service List of National Historic Landmarks by State. Appendix C states that certain units of the National Park System are automatically listed in the "National Register". Does this mean that they are automatically listed only in the National Register of Historic Places, or does there inclusion in this document mean that they are also automatically listed as National Historic Landmarks? --Buaidh 17:03, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Ha! Simultaneous to you typing this comment, I was writing my comments elsewhere on the exact same issue. Short story is, I'm confused too, and have concluded, until I see evidence otherwise, that sites listed in Appendix C are not automatically designated as NHLs. My full (overwordy?) comments are at Talk:List of National Historic Landmarks in Colorado#Yucca House, Hovenweep, Sand Creek. Ipoellet 17:33, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

I sent an e-mail to the National Park Service National Historic Landmarks Program asking for a clarification of Appendix C. --Buaidh 18:48, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

The National Park Service has replied that Appendix C pertains only to the National Register of Historic Places, and does not pertain to any designation of National Historic Landmarks unless elsewhere specifically designated. --Buaidh 19:12, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for making the effort to check this issue out with NPS! Ipoellet 22:04, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

If you look in the right part of their full National Register database you find a column which indicates the item is listed in the NHL list. So within the NRHP list the NHL items are marked as such. (SEWilco 05:17, 21 August 2007 (UTC))

Check the References

Look at the References section. It's complaining about citations without text. Probably the citation templates got changed to whine about missing descriptions. I can't fix it due to an ArbCom kangaroo court. (SEWilco 15:38, 28 September 2007 (UTC))

Warnings for Editors of new Tables of NHLs

I've now worked through all the NHLs on 3 state-specific tables of NHLs: New York's 258 or so NHLs, Arkansas' 17 NHLs, Arizona's 40 NHLs. The NYS list was created from scratch (put into table form by Dmadeo). The last two I edited from the above-discussed tables generated from NRIS reports. They provide a good starting point, but beware:

1. The table reports are lists of NRHPs, not NHLs. The number will differ (probably higher than # of NHLs in state). Editor needs to focus on getting the right list of NHLs.
2. Edit names first, before you or others follow red links to generate new stub articles using less preferable names. Many NRHP names are not exactly the same as NHL names. My preference is to edit them to use NHL name, as reported in what I call NHL summary report. Except I prefer to unwind NHL names convoluted by commas, e.g. for "Fillmore, Millard, House" I prefer "Millard Fillmore House"
3. Putting into new alphabetical order then helps in editing. No obvious order in initial table report AFAIK.
4. Some obvious duplication needs to be removed. E.g. multiple occurences of "Merritt Parkway" for each township in CT that it runs through. Easy.
5. Usually boundary increase NRHPs are also easy to eliminate.
6. Some NHLs will not be covered. The NRIS data does not necessarily indicate NHL status correctly. Arkansas's table report missed 3. Arizona's table report missed 2 or 3, depending on interpretation of one complicated situation
7. Some listed NRHPs are not NHLs at all, not associated no way with a NHL. AZ report generated 2 or 1, depending on interpretation of one complicated situation.
8. Date column, labelled "Date Listed", provides year in which site was listed in NRHP, not what I want to present. After editing an article for every NHL that included infobox distinguishing between NHL designation date vs. NRHP date, I then came back and replaced this column by "Date Designated" giving year of NHL designation for each one.
9. Multiple NRHPs may be associated with a single NHL. Example: Mary Jane Colter Buildings in AZ relates to 4 separate NRHPs, of which 2 appeared in table report. Example: Camden Expedition Sites in Arkansas relates to 8 or 9 NRHPs, all 9 candidates appeared in table report.

This is just a warning to editors. I believe that using the table report as a starter was a help overall. A big benefit is that it makes you notice boundary increases and NHLs that are otherwise comprised of more than one NRHP, so that your article on the NHL can include all the refnums and properly describe them all. Without this table report, and forcing you to try to find the NHL home for each row in it, it would be easy to miss many of those. Thanks and credit due to the several of you who provided the table reports. doncram 02:40, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

The database-created tables are sorted by county. There were several reasons, although the only one I remember is some eastern states have so many entries that articles by county are needed. As mentioned, the NRIS database has one entry for each county which a site is in. One battle site took place at a river crossing which is now a county line. The Arkansas point from which the Louisiana Purchase was surveyed is at the intersection of three counties. Click "Preview" while editing and sort the table by name and such duplicates become apparent. (SEWilco 03:02, 1 October 2007 (UTC))

Disambiguation Page

I thought the name of the game here is to minimize or prevent disambiguation. Now we've got people stripping entire sections to make new pages! Isn't that just as bad a purposely making an entire group of disambiguated pages? --Dp67 | QSO | Sandbox | UBX's 11:49, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Are you expecting this article to contain all the NHLs? There are thousands, and we can't fit them all on a single usable page with current Wikipedia technology. (SEWilco 14:43, 4 October 2007 (UTC))

Recommend you visit Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/NHL coords to see what happens when even a mostly complete and highly stripped-down list of all the NHLs looks like - and how slowly it loads. Yikes! So our goal has been to break out one list per state, and keep List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state as an index to them all. This approach wouldn't be desirable if the comprehensive list would reasonably fit on one page, but definitely is here. Plus, this gives us an opportunity to get the members of the individual states' WikiProjects involved in improving the NHL articles - each list is being tagged to its state's WikiProject as well as {{WikiProject National Register of Historic Places}}. Ipoellet 16:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

There are similar lists of the even more numerous NRHP sites. The NRHP pages will need a similar structure with even smaller granularity. (SEWilco 16:04, 5 October 2007 (UTC))

And maybe in the end the entire system of lists can achieve FL status... One can dream. Ipoellet 16:09, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Too much empty space

I think the text should be more tightly packed together in the new regional format. Because the empty space is due to the size of the pictures, either shrink the pictures (maybe 100px) or stop trying to show one per state and just show a few pictures from each region. (SEWilco 17:44, 6 October 2007 (UTC))

I've been pondering for a while what this index list should look like once all the individual landmarks are cleared out. I'm not sure I like the regional format - it doesn't strike me that it adds anything to an understanding of the portfolio of NHLs. But I do like using images in lists - it adds interest to a format that by its nature is rather dry and repetitive. And, yes, it needs to be compacted down. So maybe another table, something like this:

State	Number of landmarks	Landmarks tallied under another state	Withdrawn designations	Sites determined eligible for landmark designation	Image
Cascadia	73	2	3	0

-Ipoellet 05:35, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Consider marking the Image column as non-sortable. (SEWilco 06:54, 7 October 2007 (UTC))

Fine with me, but to the limited extent of my knowledge of HTML and wikicode, I can only make all the columns sortable or none. Can you help with that? Ipoellet 04:26, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Several clicks later... It's at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Sorting#Making_a_column_unsortable. Added to above example. (SEWilco 04:36, 8 October 2007 (UTC))

Very cool. Thanks. Ipoellet 16:30, 8 October 2007

How about

State	Number of landmarks	Earliest declared	Latest declared	Sites determined eligible for landmark designation	Image
Cascadia	73	August 9, 1973	June 10, 2003	0

By including earliest and latest date of designation (which I made up, are not truly the dates relevant for Cascadia) in the table, am trying to give it a more historical and/or newsworthy quality. How many landmarks withdrawn is of some interest but not of great interest. I think a reader might be more interested to go search for the earliest and latest declared, and then go to see those. Can search in this main list for which state has the most recently declared one, then go look for that in the given state list. The earliest declared NHLs may be the big eastern states like List of National Historic Landmarks in New York, where I am just now noticing the 7 declared in October 1960 were the earliest. Or, who knows, it may be in a western state. The earliest National Monument was Devil's Tower National Monument in Wyoming. I recently believed African Burial Ground was the most recently declared National Monument, but in fact it is Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument. doncram 18:37, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Good idea to boil down the summary info and including both dates (and easy to keep updated with sortable table dates in state articles). The US-NHL and State-NRHP text should be defined as a standard at the top of state NHL lists, and they then are not really needed in this list. (SEWilco 18:44, 8 October 2007 (UTC))

I'm on board with all of that, except that if we aren't going to put "withdrawn designations" in, then I doubt "sites determined eligible" is so important that it should be kept. That column should be removed, too.

BTW, I have already been pursuing a standard format for the state-level articles, including the cross-refs to US-NHL and State-NRHP as SEWilco suggests. I can formally define what I've been doing, but some examples are quicker for now: AL, AK, HI, ID, KS, UT, and I'm almost there with MI and OR. I guess I went pretty far down this path before seeking consensus. So... do these examples outline a standard high-level format for the state-level articles that everyone thinks works well? -Ipoellet 19:36, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

In each of the state-level lists that I have been working on (including including NY, DE,CT,AR, I have been adding an external link to the NPS list of NHLs in that state. Also, I have been adding in a list of "National Park Areas in ___" the state, such as all the National Monuments, National Battlefields, etc. And there are some other differences in my bottom of page info. doncram 01:32, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

The most historically relevant National Park Service areas in a state, including National Monuments and National Battlefields, are listed on the given state's official PDF list of National Historic Landmarks. That list misses a few other types of NPS areas including National Rivers and National Recreational areas, which I have been looking up at List of areas in the United States National Park System and adding, just to complete. doncram 02:17, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I have also been adding a cross-reference list to state-designated historic sites and/or parks, which probably exist for most states. See New York State as a good example. It seems efficient and relevant to do that. All of the 37 NYS SHSs are outside NYC. For New York City, now covered on a separate List of National Historic Landmarks in New York City, it will make sense to include a cross-reference list to NYC Landmarks. Chicago Historic Sites have already been covered in a Featured List. It will probably make sense to add a cross-reference list of National Historic Landmarks in Chicago to that list. doncram 02:17, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Order of names: "Last, First" vs "First Last"

Background: List of National Historic Landmarks in Maine was originally set up by me with format "Last, First" where the landmark name was led with a personal name. Doncram reset them to "First Last" on 2007-10-17.

My reasoning in setting the list (Maine one among others) up as "Last, First" was twofold:

1. To remain as faithful as possible to the key reference that I believe we are using: National Park Service (April 2007), National Historic Landmarks Survey: List of National Historic Landmarks by State (PDF){{citation}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link), which uses the "Last, First" format.
2. Because the column is sortable alphabetically, putting the last name first keeps the sorting working as intended.

For these reasons, I personally believe we should be using the "Last, First" format. But if the consensus is to go to "First Last", then consistency is paramount. If Maine is shifted to "First Last", then we should make sure all other state NHL lists are formatted that way. In addition, they should be re-alphabetized so that the initial presentation order goes off of the first name rather than the last. (I.e. the Daniel Coit Gilman Summer House listed before Fort Halifax rather than after Fort Western. The same would apply to naval vessels: USS Arizona (shipwreck) listed under U rather than A.)

Anyone want to weigh in on this? -Ipoellet 16:52, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I noticed the Maine list was in progress and I was not sure whether the "Last, First" names were going to be "unwound" into "First Last" or not, so i (perhaps awkwardly) raised the issue by changing the entries there. Thanks Ipoellet for opening this discussion here. I came around to the use of "First Last" format while contributing to the NY NHL list that Daniel Case and Dmadeo first developed, and it was one or both of their judgment to go with First Last. I think the main reasoning was that referring to places like "Fillmore, Millard, House" is just too convoluted. So on other state lists including Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, I have been implementing "First Last" also. And yes, then logically one also has to edit the list into alphabetical order based on those revised names. About ship names, if "USS Mystate" is used it can be in the U's, or you can present it as "Mystate (battleship)" and list it in the M's. doncram 17:38, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Another idea: How about inserting a numbered order column in the state table and in the overall List of National Historic Landmarks by state table, so that a) the reader could see the count of sites in a numbered list, b) you could then place Millard Fillmore House among the F's, c) you could otherwise control the order of presentation, and the reader could sort another way and then sort back into that order. In long lists like New York State's, it sort of bothers me that I can't see how many there are, I would prefer a numbered list. In the overall list by states, it seems that Puerto Rico and other territories and associated and foreign states should be last, not in alphabetical order among the states. Once a reader clicks to sort by another column, the reader cannot get back to the original presentation order (States, then Puerto Rico etc), as there is not a numbered order column to sort by. What do you think about this? Could try it out in the Maine list or somewhere else. doncram 17:38, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I think in the Help pages for table sorting I've seen hidden sort keys. So you might not need a separate column to alter the sorting. (SEWilco 18:58, 18 October 2007 (UTC))

Against changing from First Last to Last, First, for various reasons. Who is going to redo state lists & change links? The Wikipedia article naming pattern is "First Last, as in John Smith House, not Smith, John, House. clariosophic 18:44, 19 October 2007 (UTC) Also if you change the Landmarks, are you going to change the NRHP lists? clariosophic 18:49, 19 October 2007 (UTC) On the NRHP list you have such problems as Levi F. Warren Jr. High School, which the NPS lists as Warren, Levi, Jr., High School. Levi Warren wasn't a Jr.; rather it was a junior high school. Changing Landmarks, on second, thought, probably is not that big a deal, but changing the Places is.clariosophic 19:04, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I think we're concerned about what is correct or best, not what is easy. If there are many changes which should be done, that task will either be on a To Do list for a while or a bot will be requested (if possible). (SEWilco 19:52, 19 October 2007 (UTC))

Well, my preference appears to be in the minority, which is fine. And there do seem to be some very good reasons to go with "First Last". For the ordering issue, I like doncram's numbered-list solution that I boxed above. Since I'm already working on a major upgrade of List of National Historic Landmarks in California, then I'll be happy to implement it there as a pilot to see how it works in practice (unless someone has an objection). It will take me a few days to finish grinding that out, but I'll try to get it done this weekend. -Ipoellet 20:53, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I've now imported the new California table, including the "First Last" format, the numbered column, and removing the cross-reference notes at the top (as in #Format for each state list of NHLs page below). Altogether, I think the format works pretty well now. Ipoellet 03:47, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Indeed it does work quite well. Great improvement for List of National Historic Landmarks in California, which awkwardly was organized by counties beforehand. I like the black stylin' in the header and number listing, at least for the stylin' bein' differen' for a chang'.  :) For California, which is a truly different than other states, I wonder if some kinda Southern vs. Northern vs. Central distinction oughta be allowed, but this is way better than before. Indeed there is wikiproject for Southern California. It is the only state that has two Blue Cross/Blue Shield systems, also, fyi. doncram 00:50, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

List Organization for non-States

It's now by state, followed by "Commonwealths and Territories", "Associated States", and "Foreign States". Not sure if the last one should be an item name, or if it should be just named "Morocco", since there is only one NHL in a foreign state. By the way, I wanted to credit Crtrue for having started use of section divisions based off of Census regions, which helps organize the non-States although it is not reflected in the list of states now. doncram 20:56, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Format for each state list of NHLs page

About List of National Historic Landmarks in Illinois, Kranar drogin commented: "I just want to comment that the begining of this page makes you want to go to another article entirely. I don't think this will pass for a Feature List when it is submitted for this. I changed it before, but I see it was changed back. I think that it should be removed from the top and just kept in the "See also" towards the bottom. There should be a link to the "Main article" in the article itself, and the second bolded title should also be removed. I would like to see if there is an argument as to why it is being kept at the top like that? Maybe it is acceptible, but I don't think it is." Currently the Illinois table follows the "standard" format, but I think Kranar makes a good point. Other thoughts / examples? doncram 21:31, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

While I personally like the main-article/see-also links at the top, the MOS should control over our "standard" template. I'll be happy to look up what the MOS may have to say on this topic and report back in a day or so. -Ipoellet 21:22, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Guide to layout is the MOS component that addresses use of the {{main}} and {{see also}} templates. Kranar drogin is quite correct that these cross-references do not belong at the top of the article. Instead, these two templates are to be used at the beginning of individual sections within an article, and only in specific circumstances. However, in our case of the state-level NHL articles:

• The link to National Historic Landmark should be in the introductory text of the article.
• The link to List of Registered Historic Places in Illinois (or whichever state) should be in the "see also" section.
• The link to List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state ideally would be in the introductory text. But since it won't fit gracefully there, I'd suggest putting it also in the "see also" section.

Ipoellet 08:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state I think could be worked into the intro. You would just have to put the link and then just type whatever to make it work. It could and should work.--Kranar drogin 03:47, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Towards Featured List

The new format of table based on Ipoellet's idea is now fairly fully implemented. What would make the article better, toward reaching Featured List or Featured article status, as Ipoellet suggests? Will it stand on its own, or should it be included in a revamped National Historic Landmark article? Or should we just keep working on the state lists for a while. I do believe the main list should not be nominated for feature until most or all of the state lists are very presentable, too, but many of them are coming along nicely. doncram 20:56, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Illinois photo pic choice

I would like to make a request for Illinois members. Could we get rid of the German U-boat for our picture on that page and replace it with something like Lincoln's Tomb. As neat as the U-boat is, its really not from or represent the state that well. I just didn't want to change it without discussion first if any is needed.--Kranar drogin 03:50, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

You mean underground U-boats are not very popular in Illinois? I assumed I just hadn't seen many because they're underground. Well, pick something else...maybe look at the pictures in the state's table and find the most common number of pillars or pick something near the center of the state. Or your favorite color. Or the first site listed, or the oldest site listed. If someone doesn't like your choice then we can continue the discussion here. (SEWilco 04:22, 22 October 2007 (UTC))

Ah no, maybe it is in Chicago. I picked Lincoln's Tomb for now, if a better image comes along that represents the state's list and the state itself, can change to that instead. Sorry to have bothered you with this, just wanted to make sure I wasn't stepping on any process here.--Kranar drogin 04:57, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

In general, since lots of NHL pictures are available for most states (most, not all - ahem, o Dakotan photographers), and no one pic is necessarily the image to represent the state, I don't think any editor should hesitate about cycling those images whenever they like - provided, of course, it's still an NHL in that state. Ipoellet 16:06, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

feh! is Lincoln's tomb all that interesting?  :) FYI in initial choices of pics for the table of NHLs by state, I sought some visual variety and topic variety across states, constrained by what photos were conveniently available. the u-boat is a fun, unusual NHL. Nonetheless, i do concur with Ipoellet's wise laissez-faire vision about this. cheers, doncram 19:46, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Map

Could the map now adorning the article be improved somehow? It is just an index to the 50 state outlines currently. If it showed the distribution of actual NHL sites, then it would be more interesting to me. doncram (talk) 04:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Nathaniel Russell House (Stair).jpg

The image Image:Nathaniel Russell House (Stair).jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check

• That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
• That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --01:35, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Nine new NHLs

Several new landmarks were just added to the NHL list: http://www.doi.gov/news/09_News_Releases/011609c.html --BaronLarf 18:43, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Reworking the duplications

Would it be reasonable to change the way in which we handle duplications? I'd like to remove the total-without-duplications column and go to the same manner in which we handle duplications in NRHP lists: give the total in each state and have a final row for duplicates. I would find this rather less confusing than the current format, which seems slightly arbitrary. Yes, it's directly dependent on the NHL program's sorting, but wouldn't it be simpler just to note duplications in a separate place from each state's list? Among other things, this would be well illustrated by the photo for the Beginning Point of the U.S. Public Land Survey: the monument marks the border between states. Nyttend (talk) 20:49, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Aside from consistency, I think it's simpler and fairer -- why should Missouri get credit for Eads Bridge -- it's more or less half in Illinois? Given that there are only 16 of them (I think), I might include the dups in both states, come to a total, and then deduct the dups, with a bullet list of them below the total. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jameslwoodward (talk • contribs) 20:38, October 31, 2009

Agreed too - seems more reasonable to handle it the way Nyttend has proposed. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 22:57, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Sure. (For Jameslwoodward if not anyone else, this NHL list was developed all the way, including getting to a non-duplicated nation-wide count better than the National Park Service provided anywhere, before any state-wide NRHP list-articles were developed at all similarly. The total obtained differed in several states from the NPS's reported totals, and not just from the assignment by the NPS of sites like Eads Bridge to one or another state. The two columns showing duplicated and non-duplicated counts were indeed a bit cumbersome, contributing to me and others being a bit more economical in treatment of duplicates in the NRHP lists.) Yes, it makes sense to revise this to be likewise more economical now, too. I took a stab at revising it just now, dropping the 2nd column and revising footnotes for each site overlapping across 2 states. doncram (talk) 14:10, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Looks good. . . . . Jim . . . . Jameslwoodward (talk • contribs) 16:32, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Name of article

I moved the article to a name that reflected the fact that what is listed here are the states, but that was reverted. A list of National Historic Landmarks would have to include at least two National Historic Landmarks: this names precisely none. Ideas? Kevin McE (talk) 19:46, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Historically, this originally was a list of all U.S. states and their respective National Historic Landmarks. However, that got to be too large, so a list for each state was created. Alas, the title you chose, "List of U.S. states by National Historic Landmark" implies that you want to see which state(s) each NHL belongs to, which I don't think was your intent. The most accurate title is going to be something like "List of lists of National Historic Landmarks by U.S. state". There's plenty of precedent for that. Unfortunately, with more than 250 incoming links that's a fair amount of work to fix post-move. howcheng {chat} 18:49, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Number column not needed?

Is there any reason to retain the numeric column on the far left? It's not like the count of rows here is important. (I've added sort keys to the State column so that it sorts into the starting order.) Magic♪piano 23:25, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, probably not needed. —howcheng {chat} 00:54, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111105084558/http://www.cr.nps.gov/nhl/designations/Lists/LIST11.pdf to http://www.cr.nps.gov/nhl/designations/Lists/LIST11.pdf
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090305040615/http://www.doi.gov/news/09_News_Releases/011609c.html to http://www.doi.gov/news/09_News_Releases/011609c.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 20:00, 19 May 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on List of U.S. National Historic Landmarks by state. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20040606195612/http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/default.cfm to http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/default.cfm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 19:23, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:National Historic Landmark which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 22:17, 18 January 2022 (UTC)