Talk:Olaus Murie

Additional citations

I will be working on this article as part of a project for my class, History of Ecology. The following citations will be useful to gather more information on Olaus Murie.

Becher, Anne and Joseph Richey. “Murie, Mardy, and Olaus, Murie." In American Environmental Leaders: From Colonial Times to the Present. Amenia: Grey House Publishing, 2008. http://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/ghael/murie_mardy_and_olaus_murie/0

Dunlap, Thomas, R. “Wildlife, Science, and the National Parks, 1920-1940.” Pacific Historical Review 59. No. 59 (May, 1990): 187-202. Accessed February 21, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/.

Glover, James M. "Sweet days of a naturalist: Olaus Murie in Alaska, 1920-26." Forest & Conservation History 36, no. 3 (July 1992): 132. Accessed February 21, 2014. EBSCOhost.

Glover, James M. "Thinking like a wolverine: the ecological evolution of Olaus Murie." Environmental Review 13, no. 3/4 (Fall1989 1989): 29. Accessed February 21, 2014. EBSCOhost.

Kendrick, Gregory D. "AN ENVIRONMENTAL SPOKESMAN: OLAUS J. MURIE AND A DEMOCRATIC DEFENSE OF WILDERNESS." Annals Of Wyoming: The Wyoming History Journal (Wyoming State Historical Society) 50, no. 2 (April 1978): 213-302. Accessed February 21, 2104. EBSCOhost.

Little, John J. "A wilderness apprenticeship: Olaus Murie in Canada, 1914-15 and 1917." Environmental History 5, no. 4 (October 2000): 531. Accessed February 21, 2014. EBSCOhost.

Waterman, Jonathan. Where mountains are nameless: passion and politics in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge: including the story of Olaus and Mardy Murie. New York: Norton, 2005.

Zontek, Ken. "THE SAVVY OF A SAGE: OLAUS MURIE AND THE HISTORIC RANGE OF WAPITI IN THE WEST." Annals Of Wyoming: The Wyoming History Journal (Wyoming State Historical Society) 70, no. 4 (October 1998): 7-19. Accessed February 21, 2014. EBSCOhost. Dcbru (talk) 04:44, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

Possible expanded lead section

Hello, I have worked on expanding the lead section by adding to the original content it contains currently. The following is a possible new lead section:

Olaus Johan Murie (March 1, 1889 – October 21, 1963), called the "father of modern elk management", [1][2] was a naturalist, author, and wildlife biologist who did groundbreaking field research on a variety of large northern mammals. Rather than conducting empirical experiments, Murie practiced a more observational based science.

Murie focused his research on the North American continent by conducting vast studies throughout Canada, Alaska and Wyoming. Through these constructive yet sometimes treacherous trips, Murie was able to gain valuable experience observing species and collecting specimens. During his first expedition to Canada, Murie discovered his passion for fieldwork and was able to develop resourceful skills from his Eskimo and Indian guides, which were critical for his survival in such a harsh environment. Murie employed many of these same skills as he travelled to Alaska and finally to Wyoming.

These trips served as the foundation for many of his key ideas about wildlife management and conservation. As a scientist of the U.S. Biological Survey, Murie developed key ideas concerning predator prey relationships. Generally unheard of during his time, Murie argued that a healthy predator population was key to ensuring a harmonious balance between predator and prey populations. Murie used to these ideas to improve current wildlife management practices.

Throughout his life Murie advocated on behalf of wildlife conservation and management. With his wife, Mardie Murie, he successfully campaigned to enlarge the boundaries of the Olympic National Park, and to create the Jackson Hole National Monument and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. During his career, Murie held many respected positions within environmental organizations. He served as president of The Wilderness Society, The Wildlife Society, and as director of the Izaak Walton League. Dcbru (talk) 03:52, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Peer review

For Professor Stuhl’s History of Ecology class, I will peer review the article on Olaus Murie using the five elements of a high-quality article and beginning with the lead section. The lead section of this article does a great job in providing important and relevant information about Murie’s life including what he is best known for, his research and his contributions to science. While this lead section does provide a nice outline for what is to follow in the rest of the article, I think it could be compacted into a shorter paragraph. While all of this information may be important, there seems to be a lot of information on his research and expeditions that could be briefly summarized in this section and expanded on later in the article.

The structure of this article is clear, with well-defined subsections that highlight the information that will be discussed. From looking at other pages about significant figures, I would suggest possibly adding a “Personal Life” section and a “Professional Life.” The section “Professional Life” may be especially helpful in this article in that it may include some of the information included in the “Service, research and wildlife organizations” section, which seems to be especially long. I would also suggest breaking that section up into three different sections because it is so long, especially in comparison to the other sections.

In my opinion, I think that the different aspects of Murie’s life are equally represented. However, again I would suggest that the section, “Service, research and wildlife organizations” is broken down into smaller sections because it is a little overwhelming in its length and could be more useful to the reader if presented in smaller sections.

I think that this article does a great job of presenting information on Murie from a neutral and unbiased viewpoint. The majority of the information is presented in a factual way and cited appropriately. The article does contain a section on the awards and honors of Murie, so perhaps a section on the way his work was perceived or the impacts (both positive and negative) that his work had may help to truly discuss Murie in a neutral way.

Lastly, I think that the article draws on many reliable sources to back up the information presented in the article. The sources are both primary and secondary and enhance the article by presenting information written by Murie himself. The other sources seem to focus specifically on Murie and his work, which indicates to me that they most likely provide a lot of reliable information on his life and work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lizziewalters (talk • contribs) 00:03, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Critical evaluation

As part of Professor Stuhl's History of Ecology class at Bucknell University, I have reviewed the content of this article and would like to offer some suggestions to further improve this already well-written article. First off, I think that the lead section does a great job of summarizing the article as a whole and accentuates the key points, such as Murie's important research and campaigns. One suggestion I have to offer is to think about condensing this section. While it is very insightful, it is a bit lengthy for the overall length of the entire article. Perhaps reduce it to 2 or 3 paragraphs instead of 4.

Overall, I felt as though the structure of the article is fairly clear. It seems well thought out and is chronological. I like the headings and subheadings that are included too, but they could be balanced a little bit better. The section entitled, "Service, research, and wildlife organizations" is quite long and seems a bit out place. Maybe divide that heading into individual sections for all three subjects (one for service, one for research, and one for wildlife organizations).

With that being said, the article seems as though it covers all of the important aspects of Murie's life. One aspect that could be further elaborated on is his personal life, which would perhaps serve to give a better contextual background as to why he became the important scientific figure that he was. Also, a section covering his early life is provided, but there is no section for his later life. Adding a paragraph about him in his later years would enhance the overall balance of the article.

Throughout this article, the material provided is written in a non-biased manner. It does a good job of giving factual information and using neutral language to communicate ideas. Furthermore, the article reads like an encyclopedia article and does not exhibit proponents of a persuasive essay. In an attempt to continually advance this article, viewpoints from both positive and negative sources could be utilized more to show a variety of views about Murie.

The Footnotes and Sources sections of this article display many reliable sources. Both primary and secondary sources are referenced and an appropriate amount of sources are used considering the article's length. One piece of advice might be to check some of the website links because they do not lead the reader to the correct webpage. For example, the footnote listed as "[2] Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation web site, description of award created in Murie’s honor" displays that the page does not exist.

Keep up the good work!

Emm031 (talk) 03:21, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Further comments

I'd like to add a few comments as well. I agree with the previous reviewers that this article is overall very well done--I also found it very interesting to read in addition to meeting many of the standards of high-quality articles on Wikipedia. Murie is a fascinating figure and I'm happy to see him get stronger coverage on Wikipedia. Before I focus my comments on the content, I do want to say that many of the peer review comments above are great recommendations. I especially want to highlight the idea to further break-up the "Service..." section. Along that line, while there is very good coverage of Murie's research trips and findings, I thought you could say a bit more about his advocacy work. We did read a primary source from Murie along these lines, and I think the article could help readers understand why Murie was both in favor of protected areas for wildlife, but also concerned about how the public would use conservation areas. Such an addition to your article would complement the work you've down to show Murie's involvement with establishing parks and protected areas by setting that involvement in the historical context in which it took place. Great work so far, and looking forward to more! --Enstandrew (talk) 19:41, 15 April 2014 (UTC)