Talk:Allison family

I think we should make different biographies for the Allisons
i think it will be better —Preceding unsigned comment added by 112.203.235.41 (talk) 11:21, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

Just a cautionary note; another user completely removed a section dealing with the ongoing possibility that Loraine Allison survived the Titanic; DNA testing is forthcoming. I have close ties to the writer of the 2012 section, and can assure this community that what she is putting forth is based on voluminous amounts of documentation. Obviously, only the DNA testing will prove or disprove this claim, but in the meantime, editing of this section by anyone not closely associated with the Loraine Kramer/Loraine Allison question should be treated with great suspicion by the moderators of this site. The deleted section was restored by me last evening, and will hopefully stay, edited only for spelling and grammar unless there is verifiable information that will add materially to what Debrina Woods has written and posted.Tjtrower (talk) 05:49, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

"Additional new information 2012" section without sources
A couple of editors seem to insist on sticking in a large section (copied below) sourced only to a private website. All of this information may be true, but it isn't acceptable for a Wikipedia article without verifiable, third-party citations. When the information is published in a reliable source, it can be re-added. Please don't continue to re-add it until then. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 18:19, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

This "private website" that you reference is heavily supported by an overwhelming amount of documentation. If you are claiming that Wikipedia is fully supported by fact, and only fact, then perhaps I can show you instance after instance where information is linked to an online source that contains information that is clearly, and without a doubt, false, misleading and incorrect. That this part of the Allison story is important, and should be left alone and untouched, is clear from the reaction in the Titanic community and the high interest that this unfolding story is bringing. IF Wikipedia is to be a source of ALL information on a particular subject, then that includes material that one or two oddballs may consider off-topic, but that isn't. If you want to be the final arbiter of a part of Titanic history, do so on your own Facebook page, but leave the historic record alone as it currently reflects Titanic history in the making. Whether Loraine Allison is, or isn't, Loraine Kramer, is indeed a real part of the Titanic's story. If you want to see where I am coming from, credentials-wise, then look at my Wikipedia profile. Tjtrower (talk) 06:47, 18 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Please go and read WP:V and WP:RS on the subjects of verifiability and reliable sources. WP:V says "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. You may remove any material lacking an inline citation to a reliable source."   Until such time as you can supply citations to reliable, public sources, you may not re-add the material to the page, regardless of whether you believe it to be true or not, and also without regard to how much other craps exists on Wikipedia (to wit WP:Other Stuff Exists).  When the DNA tests are done, and published in a reliable source (like the New York Times), then they can be included here, but not until then. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 18:29, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

If you consider the "New York Times" to be a reliable source, then you are an idiot. Using the rules of proper research, that is, always relying on PRIMARY SOURCE DOCUMENTS, then I would have to, as an "editor" of your limited experience, have to gut this entire page. The page says that Hudson Allison was born on December 9, 1881. Where is a direct link to his birth certificate? The page says that Bess Daniels Allison was born November 14, 1886. Where is a direct link to her birth certificate? You see where I am going with this? Source after source is lifted directly from Encyclopedia Titanica, but this too is a site that is rife with error. (Look up the birthdate of Charlotte Collyer and tell me if it is right or not -- and then, prove it.) If you are using one website that in and of itself is not properly sourced, and ET is not, then you, Mr. Editor, need to apply the same standards to the entire Allison page. Stop being a hypocrite on this issue and realize that history may well be changed IF the DNA evidence comes back as positive. IF not, then this episode in Wikipedia history is still noteworthy. Whatever personal agenda you might have is topped by the fact that you are dealing with a Titanic researcher, historian and writer, and one who is dedicated to finding out facts, not trying to score points with your Wikipedia buddies on how many corrections you can make. I see from your profile that you are just a kid, and you are certainly acting like one. Grow up for a change. Tjtrower (talk) 19:35, 19 May 2012 (UTC)


 * First, please put your comments above the "cot" tag that collapses the box below. Second, I don't make up the rules here, please go read WP:RS and WP:V and don't argue here.  In particular, note the line in WP:RS that says "Wikipedia articles should be based mainly on reliable secondary sources."  Third, you may be correct about the rest of the article also not being sourced reliably -- if so, please feel free to stub the article.  But don't import a dispute you're having on another website here, and don't talk about your "primary sources" unless and until they are available for all to examine, and meet WP:RS and WP:V. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 04:38, 20 May 2012 (UTC)


 * I should point out the full text under WP:CHALLENGE is "All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable published source using an inline citation. The citation should fully identify the source, and the location within the source (specifying page, section, or such divisions as may be appropriate) where the material is to be found. See Citing sources for details of how to do this." Works that were never published or analysis of same was never published DO NOT COUNT. PERIOD.


 * It doesn't help that Titanic's Final Mystery is also the title of a Smithsonian program and could cause confusion if you do something awkard with google (as I did).--BruceGrubb (talk) 01:33, 21 May 2012 (UTC)


 * As I was not the person who titled the web page in question, I cannot help that particular issue. I have no fiduciary connection with this matter, but as a Titanic researcher of some note and with plenty of experience (I have been researching this subject for a decade longer than Bad Gopher has been alive) I can assure you and tell you definitively that much of the very best of Titanic research has never been made available online.  Tell me, for instance, the date of Guinevere Cassebeer's death.  I know it with certainty, but I'll guarantee you that no one reading these words will find it in an online location.  And yet, if I post elsewhere that she died in her 90s, I post something that cannot be challenged, and if removed from a Wikipedia posting, would constitute stupidity, not good editing.  If the Wikipedia community thinks that the only good information is information (in many cases erroneous) found online, then that underscores the reason that this resource cannot and should not be taken seriously.  In the section on the Ludlow Typograph (which I heavily edited) I and others have drawn on our personal experience in running the machine.  Show me where this type of experience is available on the Internet.  It is, however, locked into the minds of those few of us still using hot metal.  If Bad Gopher thinks that he or she knows the Titanic well enough to challenge me, feel free.  I'll not feel bad about exposing their ignorance of the subject.  (I have hundreds of linear feet of material dealing with ships, much of which is not digitized or otherwise available on the Internet.)  The material that is cited in the Debrina Woods-added section of this page is real, available to a very select handful of researchers, and will not and cannot be made available to the riffraff of the Internet such as Bad Gopher.  But it is real, sections of it are cited on the Debrina Woods web site, and as such stands. Tjtrower (talk) 03:50, 21 May 2012 (UTC)


 * I would appreciate it if you would refrain from making assumptions about my intelligence, my education, and my personal experience, and concentrate on what i am saying. Whether you like it or not, the citation requirements for an encyclopedia, and in particular for this encyclopedia, are quite different from those for, e.g. a history book.  I am not questioning the quality of your research, as that is irrelevant.  Whatever its quality, it is what this encyclopedia called "Original Research", and it is not allowed here.  This is perhaps unfortunate, but it is the way things are.  I have considerable personal experience in some areas, but unless I can find a reliable secondary source to provide a citation for that experience, it must stay out of Wikipedia.  Once you read WP:RS, WP:V, and the other relevant policy pages here, I would be glad to discuss ways in which we can improve the sourcing of this and other pages.  In the meantime, I would strongly advise you to adjust your tone with other editors, who may take greater exception to being insulted than I have.


 * For everyone else, may I point out that Titanic's Final Mystery (a television special about the sinking, specifically the break-up of the ship) is completely different and unrelated to the website "Titanic's Last Mystery", which is a personal website from the person purporting to be the descendant of one of the subjects of this page. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 01:34, 23 May 2012 (UTC)


 * I insult you? No, seriously, I am only pointing out the lunacy of not accepting primary source documentation.  If you get in the way of the crosshairs, then I would suggest finding a different vocation.  I point out that the emperor has no clothes and all Hell descends on me.  And that is the flaw -- the fatal flaw -- of Wikipedia as it is currently being edited.


 * Let's see. A popular singer and song writer has a web site, and from this website, a fan creates, no, better word, heavily adds to the stub article.  Primary source or secondary source? Tjtrower (talk) 05:34, 23 May 2012 (UTC)


 * There is a whole section of (dubious?) rules on exactly that topic: WP:SELFSOURCE. Read it and weep. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 05:49, 23 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Sorry, but I don't have time for your fiction. You laugh about the "dubious" rules of this site, but do nothing to change them?  You sit in judgement of articles that you have no scholarly standing on?  You hide behind a moniker that cloaks your decisions in strict anonymity, offer no proofs, and attempt to restrict content based on your flawed assumptions?  What a class act you must be.  Tjtrower (talk) 02:02, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

ADDITIONAL NEW INFORMATION 2012
On April 15th 2012 a suitcase belonging to Mrs Kramer that had been stored away for over 70 years was opened to discover hundreds of letters documents and DETAILED REPORTS from the Attorney on this case to Mrs Kramer substanciating her claim. NOTE: DNA testing will be conducted soon to settle this unique identity claim once and for all. The details will be posted at: www.titanicslastmystery.com

Helen Loraine Kramer: In 1940, she was a 31-year-old woman, former registered nurse and married with 5 children, living in a nice suburb of Detroit, Michigan as Evangeline Kramer, who wanted to go across the river to Windsor, Ontario-Canada to shop. She believed herself to be an English woman married to an American but still requiring an alien registration card and a copy of a birth certificate was needed to obtain one. She wrote to the man she thought was her father (a Mr. James Hyde) and he wrote back:

Dearest Loraine, Your story begins back in 1912, when I set sail for America on the S.S. TITANIC. On the boat I met a Mr. & Mrs. Hudson J. Allison. They had two small children with them - a 3-year-old little girl and her baby brother. Then one night it happened. The ship struck and iceberg. Hundreds of people, many still in their nightclothes were being hurried into lifeboats. I looked up toward the rail. I saw Mr. Allison holding his little daughter in his arms. I tried to get out of the lifeboat to give him my seat but was shoved back. He told me his wife and baby son were in another lifeboat. He leaned far out over the rail and handed the little girl to me. He begged me to take care of her. Before I could reply the lifeboat was lowered hurriedly into the water. As I sat there in the boat with her in my arms, I looked back just in time to see the ship roll over on its side and sink.

Weeks later, I read the list of survivors. Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Allison’s names were on those lists. I took that little girl back home to England and raised her as my own daughter. You are that little girl. Born Helen Loraine Allison June 5th 1909. So you see, I am not your father. I know you will want to find your birthplace. That, I imagine you will need for your registration card. Your mother was an American. Your father Hudson Joshua Creighton Allison was either an American or Canadian. He was listed on the passenger lists from both countries. With all the love in the world – Your Foster Father, James Hyde”

This was of course starling and life altering information for her to receive. She hired an Attorney (Arthur Flynn/Morrisburg Ontario) to investigate these claims and assist her with obtaining a birth certificate and to guide her through the rest of the alien registration process.

She then went on the popular Grape Nuts cereal sponsored: We the People Radio show and pleaded with its audience to assist her with locating any remaining relatives with whom she could reunite. She was flooded with responses. From this information she & Mr. Flynn were able to contact a Mrs. G.B (Lillian) Allison the widow of one of Hudson’s brothers, Percy Allison the youngest of Hudson’s brothers and his wife…as well as Hudson’s fathers sister Maybelle Nieman (Aunt Maybelle) Dr. Blake & Ethel Allison, Aunt Ida, Creighton Johnson Hudson’s Fathers brother and so many members of the Allison clan, friends and business associates. NOTE: At the time of Hudson Allison’s death he had amassed quite a substantial fortune….

“In a bizarre twist, Mrs. Kramer stated that on the rescue ship Carpathia, she shared a room with none other than Thomas Andrews, the designer of the Titanic who himself had perished in the sinking. She further stated that the director of the White Star Line, J. Bruce Ismay (who was later severely criticized for serious structural problems on the ship as a means of cost efficiency, ordering Captain E.J. Smith to pick up speed in icy waters, and then entering into a lifeboat when so many others died) And George, the brother of Hudson Allison, together with his wife Lillian, (both of whom stood to gain financially as the caretakers of baby Trevor) persuaded Andrews to go into hiding along with Loraine by offering him periodic bribery payments as a means to buy his silence"

The events came to a head when the lawyer representing Mrs. Kramer died in the midst of the proceedings, and when asked about the earth shattering evidence (such as the original of the first letter, letters from Ismay and a diary from Hyde/Andrews) that he had been ready to produce, Mrs. Kramer said that these papers had been lost just recently in a fire. To add to the cloak and dagger scenario, young Trevor himself had died from ptomaine poisoning in 1929 at the age of eighteen on the eve of his inheritance...so when Mrs. Kramer released her story eleven years later, it was the youngest brother of Hudson Allison, Percival (Percy) and his own family who had reaped the financial benefits of the estate.

NOTE: As mentioned IMPORTANT documentation was lost in the fire at the atty's office, what was not known was that within the suitcase and stored out of the public domain for over 70 years... were all the Lawyers detailed status reports to Mrs Kramer and from which the whole tale is told, evidence described and all details pertaining to the cases on her behalf that he was preparing to take to trial as both an immigration proceeding and separate probate case shortly before his, death.

/* References */ Arthur Flynn/Lawyer depositions & briefs and detailed lawyer to client status reports circa 1940-1942. Papers held in a private collection.

Encyclopedia Titanica references do not source original documents
Since we seem to be on the subject of proper sourcing, none of the birth dates attributed to Hudson, Bess, Loraine or Trevor Allison have the necessary primary source documents shown on Encyclopedia Titanica to back up the information listed on this Wikipedia page. I therefore ask that Bad Gopher take his or her self-appointed policing role seriously and delete this information from this page. I would hate to think that I have something personally against the Allison story, but a point is a point. Tjtrower (talk) 04:14, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
 * For a variety of reasons, Wikipedia articles must be cited to reliable secondary sources. Primary sources are generally not acceptable.  Whether Encyclopedia Titanica is a reliable source is an open question, but we shouldn't move in the direction of primary sources.  I did insert one reliable secondary source (the Chicago Tribune) into the article.  Others are available. Bad Gopher Gear (talk) 14:17, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
 * "Primary sources are generally not acceptable." Bwa ha ha ha ha ha.  Seriously?  Are you completely stoned or drunk?  You are certainly not a researcher, historian or even a student to make such a ridiculous and derelict statement.  Indeed, you expose yourself to ridicule, scorn, and certainly to the laughter of ANY serious student, writer, and certainly to the Titanic community.  We will start with my personal Facebook page, and go from there.  Too bad for you that you can't delete your ill-advised and stupid remark.  And no doubt about it, it was stupid beyond any means of defense.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tjtrower (talk • contribs) 03:34, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Incidentally, it is not an "open question" as to whether or not Encyclopedia Titanica is a reliable source. Tjtrower (talk) 03:40, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

DNA test results
On December 9, 2013, the Loraine Allison Identification Project ("the Project") announced that mtDNA testing had demonstrated that there was no relationship between Kramer and Loraine Allison. I have tried to state this information as objectively as possible, because this is a very emotionally charged issue for those involved. The Project intends to submit a press release and the sources cited can be updated when articles are published in the mainstream media. For now, the Project's website provides sufficient information.

The history of this page and its talk page show that this issue is close to the hearts of several people. The addition I have made is an objective statement about the recent DNA test results. It is not an attack on any person and it is not a matter for debate that a test occurred and the results were negative. Please keep the Wikipedia guidelines in mind if you intend to edit the main page or the talk page.

Declaration: ''I am not involved with the Loraine Allison Identification Project, and I have no financial or emotional involvement whatsoever in this issue. ''

Roches (talk) 20:50, 18 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Good addition. I trimmed some in-line URLs and clarified a point or two. Binksternet (talk) 23:04, 18 December 2013 (UTC)