Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Montague Druitt/archive3

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Karanacs 16:04, 27 July 2010 [1].

Montague Druitt[edit]

Nominator(s): DrKiernan (talk) 09:58, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Druitt was a barrister, schoolmaster and cricketer who committed suicide at the end of 1888. His death coincided with the supposed end of the Jack the Ripper murders, and as a consequence he was fingered as a suspect.

This article has been read and amended by two experts in the field: Debbie MacDonald [2][3] who wrote The Prince, His Tutor and the Ripper and who favors Druitt's innocence, and Andrew Spallek (editing as an IP) [4][5] who wrote 5 articles on Druitt and who favors his guilt. Consequently, it is a well-written, balanced, reliable account which has been verified by two independent expert contributors, one from each side of the debate. DrKiernan (talk) 09:58, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment—no dab links, no dead external links. Ucucha 10:05, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comments In the section which discusses him as a ripper suspect, it states that Cannon Street is a few minutes walk from Whitechapel. Although it can be done on the tube in a few minutes, it is more like half an hour on foot. Druitt's chambers at Inner Temple are about an hour on foot (again, the tube connects the two in less time). Are these statements based on geographical manipulations by the authors claiming him as a suspect, or due to an unfamiliarity with the distances involved between the locations? --DavidCane (talk) 13:56, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I and Leighton agree with you that the Inner Temple is 1 hour from Whitechapel, but Spallek thinks that Cannon Street is a few minutes and the Inner Temple 15 minutes "at a brisk pace" and no more than 30-40 minutes at normal pace from Whitechapel respectively. As Spallek's is the only published time for Cannon Street, I guess we must rely on his word (or replace it with a distance). For the Inner Temple, the timings vary between 15 minutes and 1 hour between sources, so I have excluded the time and just used "walking distance". DrKiernan (talk) 10:00, 18 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's a good idea to remove the times, although, if authors are manipulating the time frames to suit their arguments, that might also need to be mentioned. The Transport for London Journey planner (here) can generate walking routes and times for any two points in London (turn off all other modes of transport to force it to calculate a walking route).--DavidCane (talk) 21:04, 18 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sources comment: This is an old friend. All sources look OK, no outstanding issues. Brianboulton (talk) 22:27, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments Generally quite good, a few things I noticed.

Lede

Can anything be done about the first paragraph? A second sentence would be good.

Family and education

"nee Harvey". I would put in parens.

"Justice of the Peace" perhaps in lower case?

I would certainly consider splitting the second paragraph into at least two paragraphs. You could do it anywhere, really.

Career

I guess it's OK to have the address of Druitt's chambers. But do we really need to know the address of the boarding school?

"Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught" Hmph. His dad was some immigrant or something. Still, I suppose it would be wise to mention the name of his mom anyway, the reader may not be aware. Vikki Hanover, wasn't it?

Cricket

if any more explanation of who all the people are can be squeezed in, please consider doing it. just "first-class cricketers" would be sufficient.

Death

Does anyone say whom the cheque is from?

"could have been a final payment from the school". I realise it is well sourced, but it sounds like speculation. Perhaps rephrase to say who is speculating?

"whilst" Your kilometrage may vary, but I've usually gotten bad reactions from using that word.

That's about it. Hope you'll consider these friendly suggestions, on none of them do I insist.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:24, 20 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Some changes made[6]. I prefer Justice of the Peace as I believe it is usually capitalised in England. The writers of the cheques are unknown. I'm happy to use "while"; someone would invariably change my archaism at some point anyway. DrKiernan (talk) 17:59, 20 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support It looks good. I think this one should get through this time.--Wehwalt (talk) 18:26, 20 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support: I gave lengthy reviews at each of the previous FACs, and supported on both occasions. The article continues to improve around the edges, though in my view has long been of featured quality and I have no hesitation in supporting again. Brianboulton (talk) 11:52, 21 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support. I'm happy to support this time. I'd still prefer to see more in-text attribution; for example in sentences like this: "Some modern authors suggest that Druitt was dismissed because he was a homosexual or pederast and that it may have driven him to suicide.[65] One speculation is that the money found on his body was a payment to a blackmailer.[66] Others, however, think that there is no evidence of homosexuality and that his suicide was instead precipitated by an hereditary psychiatric illness." My preference would be to spell out who is arguing what, based on what evidence. I also think the image of the Macnaghten memorandum where Druitt is mentioned would make a good addition, but that's a preference issue. Overall it's a great read, nicely put together, and very interesting. By the way, I added an infobox [7] because I like the brief biographical overview, but I know they're not to everyone's taste, so feel free to remove. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 12:29, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I've added the image. In the case of "Some modern authors..." and "Others...", I've kept the looser attribution because there are three or more authors holding this opinion and it would be unwieldy to mention them all. In the case of "One speculation...", I've kept the looser attribution because the source critiques rather than supports the suggestion and the originator of the suggestion itself is unclear. Most of the remaining looser attributions are kept for one or other of these two reasons. DrKiernan (talk) 14:49, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.