Wikipedia:Peer review/William Claiborne/archive1
Recently expanded. General comments welcome, but think could most use advice on whether the narrative of the biography makes sense and whether the events in Claiborne's life have enough historical context. Geraldk 16:46, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
This was a really informative article! I thought you did a good job covering the details of the colonial days (although I'll qualify that by saying I love history and probably know more than a lot of people). There are some minor changes you can make that would improve readability and help you get ready for a future FA bid. Most of your prose is good, but there are some more informal word choices that should be fixed. Sometimes it helps to read the article out loud and see what sounds weird (although I recommend you do this only when you are alone!).
DoneI recommend wikilinks for all place names, but I don't know if that's a standard.- DoneYou really should have a wikilink for King James I, Privy Council, English Civil War, and for all of the governors if they have articles created
- Doneheading titles should have only first word and proper names capitalized (so should be Early life and emigration to America)
- DoneNeed metric conversions for all measurements.
- DoneThe article needs a spellcheck -- there are a few minor mistakes.
- DonePer WP:MOSBIO, all references to the subject after the first instance should be by surname only (Claiborne, not William)
- DoneFirst paragraph in Early life section doesn't flow well. It also leaves open some questions that you may not be able to answer -- why did an alderman and lord mayor leave home and move somewhere else? Was Thomas Clayborn opening a new branch of the family business? Was the elder son really apprenticed to make the family rich, to learn the family business, or just to help them get by? Do you know the name of his brother or how old william would have been when the brother was apprenticed?
I might rephrase the paragraph as such --
- William Claiborne was born in Kent, England in 1660 to Thomas Clayborn, a small-time merchant, alderman, and lord mayor from King's Lynn, Norfolk, and Sarah Smith, the daughter of a London brewer. Claiborne, who was baptized on August 10, 1660, was the youngest of two sons. His elder brother, <insert name if you know it>, was apprenticed to a London merchant in <year if known> in order to help the family.
- DoneYou should probably point out that the attacks were made by the native peoples.
- DoneThe first paragraph of the Kent Island section (except the first sentence), does not read well. Some of the verbiage could be formalized a bit more (for exampl, instead of "wanted to get a charter for a portion of the land that the Virginians considered their own," you could say something along the lines of "desired a charter for a portion of the land claimed by Virginians.")
- DoneWhere did claiborne get Kent Island settlers? Were they already there? Did he recruit them (and if so, from the colonies or from England
- DoneThe sentence about claiborne's marriage throws off the flow of that paragraph. Also, she couldn't have remained his wife through 1688 if he died in 1677.
- DoneWas Claiborne ever charged with inciting the natives? By saying that he was never convicted, the sentence implies that he was charged.
- DoneI would start a new paragraph at "In 1635, a Maryland commissioner named"
*I would flesh out the paragraph on Rich Island. How was the colony destroyed and how was that related to Spanish power in the area
- DoneRichard Ingle is described as a Puritan twice in the same sentence (and it might be good to wikilink puritan).
*I don't understand why Ingle's ships would have been seized?
- DoneIs Cecil Calvert the same as the son of the first Calvert? His name should be consistent.
- DoneThe sentence that begins "Claiborne made no over legal attempts" is a little unwieldy
- DoneThis sentence is more trivia and doesn't really belong--"Interestingly, these Puritans had been invited by Stone to settle in Maryland some years before when Puritans had not been welcome in largely Anglican Virginia"
- Donehis death date is wrong in the text of the article
*There are many places in the prose that could be improved to a more formal tone. At times, it sounds like someone is telling it as a story ("But he was, after all, "), when it should read as a more factual encyclopedia.
- DoneI would remove the legacy section. The quotation is nice, and should be incorporated into the text. You could include a family section instead that mentions his wife, anything you know about how many children he had, and then that some of his descendants were famous.
Good luck! Karanacs 01:48, 27 June 2007 (UTC)