Talk:Azayamankawin

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A fact from Azayamankawin appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 21 September 2021 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that photographers in Saint Paul, Minnesota, sold thousands of cartes-de-visite of "Old Betz" (pictured), a Dakota woman who they said was 120 years old?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2021/September. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Azayamankawin.

Did you know nomination

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 Theleekycauldron (talk) 09:04, 13 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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Azayamankawin

... that photographers in Saint Paul, Minnesota sold thousands of cartes-de-visite of "Old Betz" (pictured), a Dakota woman they claimed was 120 years old? Source: [carte de visite with "120 years old" in caption by Martin's Gallery],[photo with "120 years old" by Zimmerman],[memoirs of Dakota War of 1862 noting her rumored age of 120 years],[soldier memoir noting that every gallery in Saint Paul had to have her photo or was behind the times], "Indeed, Betsey's picture was taken by every St. Paul photographer who wanted a share of the market in 'Old Betz' photo card sales...Whitney said in 1866 that he had sold tens of thousands carte de visites [sic] of Betsey, and that some of them had reached collections in Europe." Diedrich (1995), Old Betsey: The Life and Times of a Famous Dakota Woman and Her Family, pp. 79–80, "Evidence indicates she was born in about 1803, yet by the time she was seventy, she was virtually advertised as being 120!" Diedrich, p. 7

Reviewed: First DYK nomination

Created by Cielquiparle (talk). Self-nominated at 12:22, 1 September 2021 (UTC).[reply]

. Its huge. Easily a B class. This native American's life is described in remarkable detail. Its well referenced and neutral. There are some sizable quotes which could be reduced in size but they are not too disproportionate given the size of the article. (Earwig says "unlikely"). There are several sources that talk about her presumed old age including photos. The hook is reffed, but I have to AGF Diedrich re "every St. Paul photographer". This is a remarkable effort (especially as a first DYK nomination) so no QPQ is required. Well done. (Umm Betz or Bets??) Victuallers (talk) 11:35, 2 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks for the detailed review! Very helpful. Re: "Every St. Paul photographer" — the proposed hook avoids using that wording, as does the article. And looking at the Diedrich quote again even he uses a qualifier "every St. Paul photographer who wanted a share of the market..." (Also...professional photography was still relatively new back then. In any case, the article page lists the name of the photographers in question.)

Have now considered "Old Betz" vs. "Old Bets" at length and the resolution is — keep "Old Betz" (with "z") in hook because that refers to the cartes-de-visite claiming "120 years old." (When you google "Old Betz" (with "z"), it's remarkable how "120 years old" comes up very prominently.) But the actual person was generally known as "Old Bets" (and some of the other cartes-de-visite use the "s" spelling too). Anyway have adjusted this now in the article intro as well.

(Will keep an eye on the quote sizes...did try to make sure every sentence was there for a reason but over time it may become easier to trim once some other related pages include more information.)

Tangent: Biggest thing I still want to do is to create a separate "Notes" section, but I couldn't figure out how to generate Notes easily using letters (a/b/c) in the visual editor (while still hitting the 31 August deadline for WiR). One of the biggest issues this page will run into is everyone wanting to change the birth year because most sources list "1788" which is simply incorrect (per Diedrich and others). Betsey herself stated she was still a teenager in 1819 and most of her children were born in the 1820s to 1830s; her mother who died on the boat to Crow Creek Reservation died in 1863 and was believed to be ~85 years old. Cielquiparle (talk) 11:27, 3 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

To T:DYK/P3