Here's Issue II of the project newsletter. We're trying to decide if this is sinking or floating. If you would like to contribute to next month's newsletter please jump right in at the News Desk! Have a great May.
The Ohio Portal
The maintainers of the Ohio Portal are looking to get it to featured status. They would like to ask all project members to help improve it any way they can. What needs to be done most is the supplying of selected articles and images.
There is a eight ton rock in Ohio that was removed from the Ohio River. This rock is known as the Indian Head Rock.
Dating back to the early 1800’s, this rock was seen sticking out of the Ohio River and used as a navigational mark for barges along the river. The names of citizens from the town of Portsmouth, Ohio are carved into the rock from the late nineteenth a early twentieth centuries. Some of the names were of well known families from Ohio. They would swim out to the rock, have their picture taken with it or simply carve their names into it.
With the advent of the Locks and Dams along the Ohio River, the rock eventually was submerged, but the legend lived on.
A gentleman from Ironton, Ohio located the rock after searching a very long time for it, and he and a crew of scuba divers recovered the rock and took it to the shore to be donated to Ohio for historical value.
After hearing the news about the rock being removed, Kentucky introduced legislation against the removal of the rock. They also want the diver who found it to be prosecuted for removing the rock. Kentucky owns the greatest part of the land the river runs on.
Even the Army Corp. of Engineers got involved as to how to move the rock without damaging it. Kentucky wants to have it returned to the river.
Billy Massie
Article Assessment
Reedy Bot and ShepBot are currently hard at work tagging all of the Ohio articles. We may need to have an assessment drive when the bots are finished. Think of it as a late spring cleaning. Please note your opinions on the project talkpage if you would be interested in helping!
Over 10,000 articles have been tagged with {{OH-Project}}
Article Achievements
New Featured and Good articles
Ohio was listed as a Good Article nominee; the result of the nomination was Not listed.
If you know of a Wikipedian who has contributed a lot of effort to Ohio articles feel free to award the new Ohio Barnstar of Merit by placing the following code on their user talkpage.
Add a picture to an article in the list of requested photographs in Ohio ( 354 ) (Most towns in Ohio are still on the list) or improve one of the articles with no images.