Talk:George McClellan (disambiguation)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Vegaswikian (talk) 17:50, 22 October 2010 (UTC)

George McClellan → George McClellan (disambiguation) — The move would enable George McClellan to redirect to George B. McClellan in the same manner as Lyndon Johnson redirects to Lyndon B. Johnson. A highly eminent figure, George B. McClellan (frequently referenced as simply, George McClellan) commanded the Union Army during an early phase of the Civil War, was the 1864 Democratic presidential nominee against Republican Abraham Lincoln and, after the war, served as governor of New Jersey. Discussion contains specific details regarding the proposed change.—Roman Spinner (talk) 17:44, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Civil War generals are very rarely placed as the WP:PRIMARY TOPIC. See ongoing discussion at Talk:George Sykes (disambiguation), regarding attempt to move minor Union general George Sykes from his position as the primary topic and place him on the disambiguation page as either George Sykes (Civil War general), or using any other parenthetical qualifier, such as "(general)". The discussion also includes a list of 72 Civil War generals (whose names are followed by a varied mix of at least twenty different qualifiers) who are featured within disambiguation pages, but not as primary topics (in addition to these 72 names, there are numerous other Civil War generals disambiguated by middle names or initials who also appear as non-primary topics on disambiguation pages).

George McClellan, however, is an exception. He was prominently in charge of the Union Army for a portion of 1861–62, challenged Abraham Lincoln for the Presidency and served as governor of New Jersey. In the event of a consensus to rename the George McClellan disambiguation page as George McClellan (disambiguation), the article George B. McClellan could then be also renamed as George McClellan and become the WP:PRIMARY TOPIC. If members of American Civil War task force prefer to retain "George B.", as in Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee, then George McClellan can be made to redirect to George B. McClellan in the same manner as Dwight Eisenhower redirects to Dwight D. Eisenhower. It should be noted that while Ulysses Grant redirects to Ulysses S. Grant, the same is not true for Robert Lee, which does not redirect to Robert E. Lee, but to the Robert Lee disambiguation page. However, as Civil War students and many others know, Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee are virtually never referenced without their middle initials, while George McClellan may, arguably, be known as well without his middle initial as with it.—Roman Spinner (talk) 17:51, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

• OpposeSupport. References to the general in modern Civil War histories very frequently refer to McClellan using his middle initial, and within Wikipedia, this usage is very widespread. I see no compelling justification for renaming a featured article after many years with its current name. Hal Jespersen (talk) 19:05, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Note. In view of the above comment and vote, it needs to be pointed out that the proposal, as indicated at the top, is not to rename the featured article George B. McClellan→George McClellan, a major renaming not to be undertaken lightly (akin, for example, to renaming Harry S. Truman→Harry Truman, which was, in fact, the article's original title). What Wikipedians are actually deciding in this instance is whether the George McClellan disambiguation page should be renamed as George McClellan (disambiguation). As has already been mentioned by editor Hal Jespersen, the approach of the war's sesquicentennial will have more users typing the name "George McClellan" and arriving at the George McClellan disambiguation page. If this proposal to add the parenthetical qualifier "(disambiguation)" is accepted, akin to most users tending to type Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson and being redirected to the existing article titles which bear those names along with their respective middle initials, those who would type "George McClellan", by far the most prominent of the five thus-named individuals appearing on the disambiguation page, would be pointed directly to the George B. McClellan article where an already-existing hatnote states: For other people of the same name, see George McClellan (disambiguation).—Roman Spinner (talk) 20:45, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I did not fully understand your proposal, so thank you for the clarification. Given this explanation, I'll change my view to Support. Hal Jespersen (talk) 22:07, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

• Support move to George McClellan (disambiguation) and make this into a redirect to George B. McClellan. (Hal, might you want to consider taking the same position? I do think the general is the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, initial or no.) --JaGa^talk 20:39, 15 October 2010 (UTC)
• Support move. Unambiguous primary topic. Recognizance (talk) 01:09, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.