Talk:James A. Doonan/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: ImmortalWizard (talk · contribs) 19:35, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

PHEW, I'll take this review. Will be difficult. Please give me a few days, have a busy life! Interestingly I chose this. Yes! Have no interest or background knowledge on this topic. I'll try my best. Person passed away (RIP) previous century, that means loads of offline citations that leads to lots of factual checking and scrutiny. I'll count on you Mr NOMINATOR! (Sorry for assuming gender), need your help a lot!  Immortal  Wizard  (chat) 19:35, 10 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for taking the job. I'll try to be as helpful as I can. I believe all of the references have courtesy links, which should make reviewing easier.  Ergo Sum  20:35, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Lead
I will have to come back in this section throughout for accurate review.
 * "..was an American Catholic priest and member of the Society of Jesus." - isn't it better to change it to "..was an American Catholic Jesuit priest/Jesuit priest of the Catholic Church. "? Since "member of the Society of Jesus" is not mentioned or wikilinked anywhere in the body, which might be confusing for general readers. Alternatively, it could be kept the way it is and later mentions in the body could be dealt with.
 * My hesitation about this is that with the first option, it doesn't generally make for good reading when there are too many pre-nominal adjectives strung together, and for the second option, the adjective Jesuit would be modifying priest, not Doonan, which is technically not correct (as the Jesuits are an order, not a type of priest). I've rephrased "member of the Society of Jesus" as "a Jesuit;" I think this should be clearer.  Ergo Sum  20:45, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * IDK, but to me "His presidency is principally remembered for having assuaged the university's burdensome debt accrued during the construction of Healy Hall." seems too hard to grasp, especially in the lead.
 * Rephrased. Should be clearer now.  Ergo Sum  18:08, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Should President of Georgetown University be wikilinked here in the lead. probably something like "served as the president of Georgetown University."?
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:05, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Early life

 * "parish records" and "pastor" should be wikilinked
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  20:47, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "James'" to "James's" or avoid this by rephrasing to passive form. See MOS:POSS.
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  20:49, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "James' brother, John Doonan, also became a Jesuit priest" - shouldn't this be moved a little later in the section, since the subject is yet to be a Jesuit priest. Also, it might be better to omit "Doonan" here, according to MOS:SAMESURNAME.
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  20:53, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I get that surname of the subject is plausible to be avoided, since it's in the context of family. However, the subject as only "Doonan" is mentioned once in the same paragraph that uses only "James", which might make it confusing. Considering breaking the para on that Doonan mention. I would personally mention the subject by their surname all the time. A point to be noted is that the mother's name surname was different. Basically, the naming issue is confusing and complex to me.
 * Clarified.  Ergo Sum  20:55, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * The second paragraph has some issues, mostly regarding prose. I'll try to suggest:
 * "In 1864, he was sent to Boston College to teach for three years. In 1867, he returned to Maryland, where he went to Woodstock College to study philosophy and theology." - here, in 1867 could be omitted and replaced with "following which", or however you want to rewrite.
 * Condensed the clauses.  Ergo Sum  20:58, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * not once is his name/surname mentioned.
 * Fixed.  Ergo Sum  20:58, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "His studies were interrupted by a period of teaching at Georgetown from 1868 to 1869." - it could be expanded if their is something detailed in the source. "from 1868 to 1869" - could be simply rewritten to "for a year" to avoid WP:PROSELINE.
 * Good hunch. I checked the source and there was some additional detail that shed light on the timeline. I've included this in the article.  Ergo Sum  21:14, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "After four years, he completed his classical course of study,[1] during which time he was the cadet captain of the student regiment." I think grammatically, it should be only "during which" (remove "time"), since the sentence begins after the year and "which" then refers to classical course of study, which isn't a time period. Also, I think it's appropriate to specify gender since it was all boys at that time. MOS:GNL will help.
 * Rephrased the sentence for grammar. I'm not really sure what you mean when you say to specify the gender. If you mean that the university was all-male, I would think that's a bit unnecessary, since every university in the world was all-male in 1861 (with the very rare exception of an occasional female student).  Ergo Sum  18:16, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * According to the source, isn't it Gibbons who ordained him, not Kain?
 * Yes, it is. I misread the chart.  Ergo Sum  18:22, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Georgetown University

 * " In September 1875 he went to Frederick, before returning to Georgetown in 1877 as a professor of rhetoric." - what's the significance of him going to Frederick? Could be removed.
 * Even though it's not terribly important, mentioning that he was in Frederick for a year avoids misleading the reading, who might think that he was at Georgetown for the whole period from his appointment in poetry to his appointment in rhetoric.  Ergo Sum  18:26, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "rhetoric" wikilink?
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:27, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "commencement exercises" shouldn't it be singular? nevermind
 * "He also proposed that Healy Hall's main auditorium, which remained unfinished, be completed and named Gaston Memorial Hall after the school's first student, William Gaston" - probably reordering required nevermind
 * "In the summer of 1886, a new building was constructed for the School of Medicine.[14] The larger building was designed by Paul J. Pelz and was erected on the corner of 10th and E streets in Northwest Washington, on the former site of the mausoleum of John Peter Van Ness's wife." - I think this a little bit off topic and doesn't relate to the subject. Maybe the construction could be mentioned briefly, since it's mentioned in the lead.
 * I've trimmed the sentence about the building.  Ergo Sum  18:30, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "Bishop John J. Keane, Catholic University's first rector,[16] attempted to resolve this dispute by offering to purchase Georgetown University,[17] tendering this proposal to Doonan" - I don't know exactly how, but this statement feels like a cliffhanger. If it's not that significant, I would recommend to shorten it and make it clearer.
 * It's a pretty significant event, since it would have merged two large universities. I'd added that the offer was unsuccessful, which should give the sentence some resolution.  Ergo Sum  18:38, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Replace all "these" with "that" or "the". This goes for other sections as well.
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:31, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "...were praised by the Jesuit provincial superior, Thomas J. Campbell, as he left office with a debt of only $40,000 to $50,000." - I would try not use the values. Also, "left the office" seems to appear all of a sudden, could it be altered to something like "by the end of his presidency"? And "he left.." confuses Doonan with Campbell.
 * I've rephrased to indicate that his leaving office would be a future event.  Ergo Sum  18:40, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "For several years, Doonan promoted the idea that a centenary celebration be organized,[7] culminating in the official celebration in February 1889." - replace culminating with "which eventually culminated.." or something else.
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:42, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "Leading up to this, Doonan purchased in 1885 two cannons in St. Inigoes, Maryland, for $50." reorder and possible reword
 * Rephrased to make it flow temporally.  Ergo Sum  18:43, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Later life

 * wikilink Church of the Gesù
 * It's not the Jesuit mother church in Rome that was made pastor of, but the church in Philadelphia by that name; I've clarified this in the article. Despite it being a significant building, there's no Wikipedia article for it.  Ergo Sum  18:45, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * " He then spent a year in Detroit, Michigan. In 1891, he was sent to Boston College, where he remained until leaving for Saint Joseph's College in Philadelphia, where he remained until 1896." copyedit.
 * Rephrase.  Ergo Sum  18:49, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "Fearing that he would become totally blind, he completed a pilgrimage to the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in France, and he never did lose his sight completely" - could be divided into two anyhow
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:49, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * " Philadelphia" does not require wikilink
 * Done.  Ergo Sum  18:49, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Results

 * GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)


 * 1) It is reasonably well written.
 * a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
 * Mostly great with some issues here and there
 * 1) It is factually accurate and verifiable.
 * a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources):  c (OR):  d (copyvio and plagiarism):
 * 1) It is broad in its coverage.
 * a (major aspects): b (focused):
 * consensus required
 * 1) It follows the neutral point of view policy.
 * Fair representation without bias:
 * 1) It is stable.
 * No edit wars, etc.:
 * 1) It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
 * a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/Fail:
 * a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/Fail:
 * Pass/Fail:

I keep this on hold for 7 days.  Immortal  Wizard  (chat) 19:26, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I believe I've caught up to all of your comments.  Ergo Sum  19:17, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Alright, passing this; an excellent article. I would recommend having a peer review and getting people who have corresponding knowledge involved for further polishing. The one thing I can suggest is to make it more comprehensive. Apologies for being a bit harsh over doing the fact checking. To me, verifiability is as important as the content.  Immortal  Wizard  (chat) 20:17, 13 January 2019 (UTC)