Talk:John Sutter/Archive 1

Territory
A proper Spanish name would be Nueva Helvecia. Being Sutter a non-native speaker of Spanish, I can't say if that Nuevo Helvetia is historic or a typo. Could you explain what parts of current California New Helvetia covered? I read that the current value of the estate that the 49ers squatted would be enormous, not counting the gold they stole.


 * There were two seperate Rancho Neuva Helvetias owned by Sutter, one in current Sacramento County, covering the area in and around Sacramento and one in present Yuba and Sutter Counties, including Marysville and Olivehurst. Sutter also owned Rancho Esquon, south of Chico in Butte County, and Fort Ross in Sonoma County.  The property values of these ranchos, and Fort Ross, would be in the tens or hundreds of billions of dollars today.  (Source for locations of Sutter's land is  California a Snapshot in Time 1850, by Janice Marschner, ISBN 0-9677069-3-9). Gentgeen 21:48, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Helvetia is not Spanish, and there is no Nuevo/Nueva: it's New Helvetia, and I've never seen it printed any different until now. Nueva Helvecia is a city located to the Southeast of the department of Colonia in Uruguay whose capital is Colonia del Sacramento, so I believe that's where the confusion is coming from. A Google search of "New Helvetia" turns up about 39,300 results refering to Sutter's settlement. "Nueva Helvecia" turns up 34,200 results refering to the city in Uruguay. "Nuevo Helvetia" and "Nueva Helvetia" turn up only 735 and 557 hits respectively, which are most likely typos or uneducated mistakes considering that neither are proper Spanish, and like I said before, I've never seen either in print. Spintriae 22:25, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Sut(t)er
As far as I know, the real name of John Sutter was Johann Augustus Suter, with a single t. That explains why Blaise Cendrars, who knew well a cousin of Sut(t)er, wrote suter in his novel. Jean-no 17:17, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually no. Sutter was born as Johann August Sutter (with two "t"). It's worth noting that his father (Johann Jakob) was born as Suter (with one "t") following the tradition of spelling the name of Suter in the village of origin in Switzerland (Rünenberg). But Johann August being born in the village of Kandern (i.e. in the margravate of Baden in Germany, situated 13 miles from Basel), not in his Swiss village of origin, the name was spelled with two t's.

FA nomination for California Gold Rush
The California Gold Rush article has been nominated for Featured article status. If you would like to comment on this nomination, please go here to leave your comment. To leave a comment on that page, click the [edit] link to the right of the title California Gold Rush.NorCalHistory 20:02, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Liestal
New Helvetia says he is from Liestal. --84.20.17.84 15:42, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Categories
Why are two of the categories for this article Mormon pioneers and History of the Latter Day Saint movement? Was he a mormon?Orangemarlin 01:58, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Untitled
Shouldn't be it be February 15,1803 for his birthdate for the headline on this page named The New World.67.164.26.4 (talk) 19:16, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Origin
Sorry, but if he was really born in Kandern, Baden-Württemberg then he was German - therefore he was German-American. Or are you from Kanada if you were born in Boston or Portland?? Or are you Mexican if you were born in San Diego?? See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kandern — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.172.141.191 (talk) 20:27, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

He was born in Kandern(Germany), close to Basel (Switzerland). But: His parents were swiss --> so he was also swiss citizen of Rüneberg in the Canton Basel-Land. He made his apprenticeship in Basel. See: http://www.videoportal.sf.tv/video?id=fc2cbb89-5c38-4365-99b5-7b8c396ace7a — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.155.114.95 (talk) 21:56, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Germany and Switzerland had, and still have, the Jus sanguinis and not the Jus soli you may know from the U.S. Swiss citizenship is inherited; by Swiss law, you are considered Swiss if born in Germany (or any other country) to parents of Swiss citizenship, and vice versa the children of foreigners born in Germany are not considered Germans there. Therefore, Sutter was, according to Swiss and German custom, considered a Swiss born in Germany, but not a German at all. Gestumblindi (talk) 00:42, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

death
he died "almost poor"? PurpleChez (talk) 04:20, 24 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Not anymore. Now he doesn't die in the lede at all. Far from perfect, but better. Rivertorch (talk) 07:05, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Use of word "discovery".
Next time you read about gold around the world how many discoveries will there be in a row, before you realize that all it takes is one discovery, and all the rest just support your notion that gold already exists.66.74.176.59 (talk) 04:03, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

"Employed"?
This article, at least, takes us to task for saying that Sutter "employed" the local Indians, providing a (sadly, uncited) quotation from one of Sutter's managers: "I had to lock the Indian women and men together in a large room to prevent them from returning to their homes in the mountains at night. Large numbers deserted during the daytime." There's also more there, though none of it specifically cited to solid sources. Someone working on this article should probably follow that up. - Jmabel &#124; Talk 21:51, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Conversely, our article provides no citation for the statement that Indians were employed rather than enslaved. - Jmabel &#124; Talk 21:53, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
 * I've allowed a week here. There is no citation for the current text, and obviously there is some dispute over the matter, so I will reword to leave the question open. Again, I'd love it if someone working on this article would do some appropriate research. - Jmabel &#124; Talk 16:50, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

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Birth date inconsistency
The birthdates in the body text and the infobox are inconsistent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.164.1.170 (talk) 02:49, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Done. The cited source says Feb 23. Meters (talk) 04:12, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Hmm, that got rid of the unsourced Feb 20, but we apparently have two sources that disagree on Feb 15 or Feb 23. Teh info box list both, but the lead uses one and the "Early life" section uses the other. Meters (talk) 04:15, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, the info box text is an attempt to lsit both, but only the forst displays. So, which do we go with, or how do we rewrite this to accommodate both? Meters (talk) 04:19, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

"John Sutter" vs "John Sutter Sr."
An IP has been attempting to change the mentions of John Sutter to John Sutter Sr. The first attempt was unsourced, the second was justified by what another Wikiarticle uses, and the third by the title of a 150 year old book. Our article is titled "John Sutter" and the references cited in the article that I checked I did not check all of them) consistently use "John Sutter". with no Sr. If WP:COMMONNAME gives us the title "John Sutter" does it make any sense to change the article contents to use "John Sutter Sr."? Meters (talk) 20:56, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Why Sr. is well sourced
Nobody is born "Sr.", it's added after they name their son Jr., by writers who want to distinguish them. A book was published in 1867 while he was still alive calling him Sr. for this reason, and this proves the case. https://books.google.com/books/about/John_A_Sutter_Sr_and_His_Grants.html?id=dUkdHQAACAAJ John A. Sutter, Sr., and His Grants by John A. Laufkotter, Russell & Winterburn, 1867

So, the lead line should say "John Augustus Sutter (Sr.)". == 74.95.112.141:


 * In most cases, the lead sentence should echo the name used in the article title. Per WP:COMMONNAME, "Wikipedia generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources)...." The title of one book does not establish which is most commonly used for Sutter. One place to begin is to look at the reference cited in the article. (Procedural notes: You don't need to begin a new section to reply to a comment. Please sign and timestamp your talk-page posts by typing four tildes ( ~ ). Rivertorch FIREWATER  06:59, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I don't understand the stubborn reversions of Sr. in the lede sentence, entirely consistent with MOS:FIRST. WP:COMMONNAME applies to page names and doesn't forbid any mention at all of, for example, Samuel Langhorne Clemens. Sparafucil (talk) 07:17, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I don't know about forbidding mention; I just said that in most cases it should match the title, and I have yet to see evidence that the title should change. It's all about readers finding the right article as easily as possible. It seems to me that if disambiguation is needed, a hatnote would work better, but I'm not adamantly opposed to including "Sr."; there is precedent. Incidentally, I wonder why is there no redirect from [John Sutter Jr.]] to the son's article? Rivertorch FIREWATER  07:38, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * User 74.95.112.141 was trying to add Sr. to the lead sentence, not to the article name or subsequent mentions. Do the parentheses seem like a good compromise? Sparafucil (talk) 08:26, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * No, because names don't commonly have parenthetical elements. Either it should be there without the parentheses or else not there at all. Rivertorch FIREWATER  15:54, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree; done. Sparafucil (talk) 20:02, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Changed it back. There's no consensus here that this should be changed. Tee article title does not use Sr and the sources I checked do not use it. One book published in 1867 does not override COMMONNAME. Meters (talk) 02:06, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Commercial failure
Even though most California school children know his name, he was a commercial failure who resented the fact that his son (John Sutter Jr.) had succeded where he had failed.

Why was this placed in /Talk? maveric149

He was not a commercial failure.

Unfortunetely, I must disagree. Sutter's Fort failed, Sutter's Mill was not profitable, Sutter was not able to take advantage of Marshall's discovery of gold there, Suttervile faded into history, and I remember reading that Sutter died a poor man. Sounds like a commercial failure to me. maveric149

Having been raised in California, I can tell you that the required history texts for California history say Sutter died poor and always point out the historic irony that, despite his pivotal position in the beginnings of the Gold Rush, he made little money from it. JHK

Why this talk about Sutter having failed commercially and having died poor? Is wealth the main standard for appraising the life of a man? Actually Sutter was a great adventurer, a symbol of those early pioneers who travelled from Europe to America, crossed the continent and settled in California. He fled bankruptcy in Switzerland, okay - should have he gone to jail as it was the tradition in this time? He went on board an American ship, "Sully", which made the distance between Le Havre (France) and New York in 45 days - he arrived there on 14 July 1834. He went west, tried to trade on the Santa Fe trail and in Westport, but he was obviously not an entrepreneur. Except that he built an empire in the Sacramento Valley and played a decisive role in the shift of California from Mexico to the US. Yes, the discovery of gold was his tragedy, and it would take a whole book to explain why. But his life crossed the whole 19th century (from 1803 to 1880) and circumstances made that he met a lot of those men who played an important role in this part of US history (for example: John Fremont, Kit Carson). So he should be recognised perhaps not as a hero but at least as a unique character who took many risks to build a new life in the new world. In doing that he contributed to change the fate of California. And he died poor, yes, (but less than legend says), and so what? What a beautiful journey he made!

Text in question placed back in article.