Talk:Lever Brothers

Merge from James Darcy Lever
A proposal to merge the James Darcy Lever article into Lever Brothers article was put forward in July 2011. James Darcy Lever was the younger brother and co-founder of Lever Brothers. Another editor states James Darcy Lever is not notable and for the same reason he feels the name James Darcy Lever should not appear in any wikipedia articles, removing the younger brother from all history on wikipedia would need to be addressed under another header. The question is - Should the article about James Darcy Lever be merged into the article about Lever Brothers? --Pennine rambler (talk) 20:20, 18 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete the James Darcy Lever article. He is not notable, just the brother of a successful businessman. Everything that needs to be said about him is in this or the William Lever article so no need to merge anything. The only editors who suggest keeping this highly obscure article are a first time editor and another with a few contributions to articles connected with Lever. --J3Mrs (talk) 20:33, 18 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep James Darcy Lever, or Merge. The article on Lever Brothers should include a brief explanation (based on good sources, obviously) of why the firm's name is Brothers, plural, but most sources only refer to one brother, William Hesketh Lever.  The explanation seems to be based on JD's illness.  I agree that the notability of JD is marginal (and a genealogy is unnecessary), but a fuller explanation is needed in this article of his role in the setting up of the company.  Incidentally, we also clearly need an article on All Saints Church, Thornton Hough, where he should also be mentioned.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:55, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment James Lever's memorial window is mentioned in the Thornton Hough article and his role in the company was marginal. MacQueen p.144 The vanishing man who dropped out of the narrative before the General Offices were even completed, he appears to be already merged. — Preceding unsigned comment added by J3Mrs  (talk • contribs) 21:18, 18 July 2011
 * Just noting that you added the text about James after my comments above - your comment that the content is "already merged" might be misconstrued. I've tweaked the wording, for tone, and to better reflect the content of the book chapter - but thank you for drawing the book to my attention.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:06, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Changed opinion accordingly. Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:11, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * He was already merged before my edit in that he took very little part. I just thought I'd increase his profile.--J3Mrs (talk) 22:18, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Removing James Darcy Lever From History
Below I invite discussion regarding removing James Darcy Lever from wikipeida, both in his article and in all other articles on the grounds of notability, as per proposed deletion.--Pennine rambler (talk) 20:20, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * He is mentioned, though not in the detail you propose. I have no idea why you think he has been expunged except I have removed a load of trivia more suited to a family tree than an encyclopedia.--J3Mrs (talk) 20:37, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The idea that any mention of James Darcy Lever should be deleted is clearly preposterous - WP is full of mentions of individually non-notable people who are significant in the life histories of other individuals and other articles generally. Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:55, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

US headquarters
It appears that the Lever headquarters in the U.S. was in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the 1930s and into the 1940s, based on press reports of the time. The company operated a major soap factory on Broadway in East Cambridge, where Technology Square is now located. (See Sanborn maps of the period for details, although there's no indication that the headquarters was located there.) The U.S. operations are now branded "Unilever United States", but the legal identity, unless it has changed recently, is Conopco, Inc.  18.26.0.5 (talk) 02:17, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The Lever Bothers were Jews - not even crypto but practicing
Weird that the Lever's Jewishness has been left out of the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.5.80.25 (talk) 10:45, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Section on forced labor
Portions of the section now titled "Use of forced labor in the Congo" have been deleted, seemingly (to me, at least) at random.

For example, the current version mentions the 40 crates per month quota, but fails to mention explain the harshness of this quota even from the perspective of Pierre Ryckmans, a man not opposed to the idea of forced recruitment in principle. (On page 137, there is a passage in which Ryckmans explains that he is not against forced recruitment in principle, but he did have some objections to the way it was being carried out in actual practice.) "Ryckmans recommended that the quotas should vary throughout the year to correlate to the rate at which clusters ripened" fails to get the point of this. From the perspective of someone who has not read the book by Jules Marchal, does this mean that Ryckmans thought the quota was fine for off-season months but should be increased during the months that more clusters ripened? Or the opposite, that the quota was fine for months of peak production but should be decreased during off-season months? Somewhere in between? A couple quotes included in the previous version of the article makes the matter more clear. "A more or less constant output can only be achieved ... by imposing an effort upon the natives that is in inverse proportion to the natural production of the palm groves. Hence ... the grievances of state officials "harassed by complaints, to borrow a phrase used by one of them, invariably during the rainy season, hence the excessive pressure put upon the cutters by some company agents, who fear being in the company's bad books if production should fall; hence, finally, the bitterness and disgust for the occupation of the cutter felt by the workers, who are accused of laziness and of ill will, and who are sometimes even prosecuted." And also, "What is an agent to do upon receiving such directives, except abide by them? He will harass the natives, pester them, set capitas and sentries on their heels, punish them for having failed to harvest non-existent fruit, while waiting until such a time that, through the above-mentioned labour contract, he may have recourse to the state to apply still more effective sanctions to the "recalcitrant" ... Is it any wonder that the occupation [of fruit cutter] has a bad reputation?" Without this context to clarify the matter, it is pointless to even mention the 40 crates per month quota or Ryckmans' recommendation for changing it.

There was also a sentence about how the HCB sought a monopoly on the right to buy palm fruit. This sentence ought to have been expanded into at least a paragraph, given that Jules Marchal devotes and entire chapter to the subject, but instead it has been deleted entirely.

The paragraph on the Lejeune report has been shortened. It still mentions disease and mortality, but fails to include some of the contributing factors to that disease and mortality: the lack of food, adequate shelter, and blankets. A casual reader, unfamiliar with the book by Jules Marchal, might conclude that the Africans were simply dying of natural causes. Additionally, asserting that slaves ought to be graetful that they at least have a job, food, and a bed is a common tactic used by those who seek to minimize the issue of slavery and claim that we should instead be more worried about unemployment. While people must decide for themselves whether slavery or unemployment is a more important issue, it is important to emphasize that slaves often do not receive adequate food or shelter, and would in many cases have more food and better shelter if left to their own devices. Reports like the one by Lejeune help to emphasize that. Additionally, while the Lejeune report contains minimal mention of the actual coercion used by the Belgian government and the HCB, it does provide ample evidence that the HCB was not providing conditions which would entice workers to come of their own free will, and the current version of this article does not make that clear. Oddly, while the summary Lejeune's original statements regarding food and blankets were deleted, the responses to those statements from Edkins and Engels are not. The responses now seem to lack context. The responses from Alphonse Rhodain, a chief medical officer, were also removed, and again I am not sure why.

The previous version of the paragraph on the use of prison sentences to combat absenteeism showed collusion between the Lever Brothers and the state by showing how they were simply arguing over the appropriate length of said prison sentences. Without the summary of Commissioner general Alphonse Engels' response, I don't believe the current version gets the point across.

This is not a complete listing of all the things which have been deleted, for no apparent reason to me, but it does go over some of the omissions I found most glaring at first look. Ashy Waves (talk) 14:45, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
 * The content you added was an extreme example of WP:UNDUE weight; the amount of content and level of detail about one subsidiary was several times larger than the rest of the article. It's still excessive, and should be a one or two paragraph summary of the labor issues involving that subsidiary, not a thesis. OhNo itsJamie Talk 15:11, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

, it's hypocritical for you to keep linking a webpage you clearly do not believe in. The webpage you link states, "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." So far as I can tell, it does not say anything about the actions of a company somehow becoming less important just because they do some legal paperwork to create a subsidiary. Some of the less detailed references do not even mention that a subsidiary was used and instead simply attribute the forced labour to Lever Brothers or Unilever. Given that you have previously stated that, "The number of references you list here has no bearing on the discussion", it is hypocritical for you to continue linking that webpage. I suppose, now that I have said this, you are about to block me, or arrange for me to be blocked, as you have already threatened. Ashy Waves (talk) 16:00, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

I am not sure about the appropriate procedure for a request for comment, but I expect to be blocked at any time for disagreeing with another editor and so I am in a hurry to request comments from people who actually care about references and don't merely link to webpages that talk about references while ignoring references themselves. I am simply in a hurry to do this while I am still able, before being blocked, and hope I can be forgiven if there is something procedurally wrong. Ashy Waves (talk) 16:13, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

The dispute is related to including information about the use of forced labour in the Belgian Congo by Lever Brothers. Here is some references that I have reviewed personally. I consider the first on the list to be the highest quality, most comprehensive of them, but the others help establish that there are other authors besides Jules Marchal who have concluded that Lever Brothers did indeed use forced labour in the Belgian Congo. I would like to add that Lord Leverhulme's Ghosts quotes large passages of primary source material, so other sources are indirectly included within it, making it, in a sense, multiple sources within a single source.

First published as Travail forcé pour l'huile de palme de Lord Leverhulme: L'histoire du Congo 1910-1945, tome 3 by Editions Paula Bellings in 2001.

Here are some sources that I have not personally reviewed, but perhaps there might be someone else out there who is able to find them. They are listed by Jules Marchal as sources that he used. However, many are in French, located at the African Archives in Brussels, or otherwise difficult to find.

Chalux, Un an au Congo Belge, Brussels, 1925

Denis Leopold, Les Jesuites Belges au Kwango, Brussels 1943

A. Lycops, O. Louwers and G. Touchard, eds, Etat independant du Congo. Recuil usuel de la legislation, 7 bols, Brussels, 1902-1913

Henri Nicolai, Le Kwilu, Edition Cemubac (Centre scientifique et medical de l'ULB en Afrique Centrale), LXIX-1963

W.A.G. Ormsby-Gore, Report by the Hon. W. A. G. Ormsby-Gore M.P. (parliamentiary under-secretary of state for the Colonies) on his visit to West Africa during the year 1926, London, September 1926, command paper 2744.

Jacques Vanderlinden, Pierre Ryckmans, Brussels 1994

Charles Wilson, The History of Unilever, 3 vols, London 1954

The following deposits from the African archives that are stored in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Brussels: AI: Affaires indigenes AIMO: Affaires indigenes et main-d'oevre du gouvernement general FP: Force publique GG Leo: achircives due gouvernement general a Leopoldville H: Hygiene MOI: Main-d'oeuvre indigene SPA: Sevice due personnel d'Afrique T: archives de la 3e direction generale, tome A 47, dossiers T (terres)

Also semi-official publications from the AMC (Annuaires due Ministere des Colonies), BA (Bulletin administatif et commercial du Congo Belge), BCB (Biographie Coloniale Belge), and BO (Bulletin officiel)

Ashy Waves (talk) 17:18, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't understand why you continue to impugn bad motives on other editors. Several editors including myself have tried to give you helpful advice on your talk page about how to avoid being blocked again. My comment about your exhaustive list of sources was that it was irrelevant to the issues of WP:WEIGHT and WP:SOAPBOX, and Righting great wrongs. Even after pruning, the section on labor issues by one subsidiary of the Lever Brothers is as large, if not larger, than the rest of the article. That's a clear example of undue weight. OhNo itsJamie Talk 18:17, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

, you claim the list of sources is irrelevant, but then the three pages you link all talk about the importance of references. "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources", "but we can't ride the crest of the wave because we can only report that which is verifiable from reliable and secondary sources", "you'll have to wait until it's been reported in mainstream media or published in books from reputable publishing houses", "All article topics must be verifiable with independent, third-party sources, so articles about very small "garage" or local companies are typically unacceptable." To link pages that talk about the importance of the references in the same sentence that you insist the sources are irrelevant is an example of hypocrisy.

The prejudice you and others have against including information about slavery and forced labour is an example of systemic bias.

Because there are very few slaves, former slaves, and forced labour victims who have internet access and are able to edit Wikipedia, topics of interest to them are systematically deleted or never included to begin with. Ashy Waves (talk) 18:28, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

Watson
Watson comes from Low Bolton and lived his entire life in Sellafield and Braystones.

https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/William_Henry_Watson

It is a pity that the chemist behind vegetable soap only gets minor mention.

185.219.109.145 (talk) 12:04, 9 September 2020 (UTC)


 * It's a pity that, so far, no volunteer - such as yourself - has started writing an article about him. Articles don't just emerge by magic. And was he "William Henry Watson" or "William Hough Watson", as most other articles seem to say.  (And, if the latter, is there any connection with "Thornton Hough"?)   Ghmyrtle (talk) 12:48, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
 * It is indeed a great pity. At the route of this is a fundamental problem with WP:GNG. I once wrote an article on on Roger Mitchell who was one of the founders of "Peat Marwick Mitchell & Company" which for 60 years was one of the largest firms of accountants in the UK and is now better known as KPMG. However the article I wrote got deleted, despite my pleas, because it failed WP:GNG which requires "significant coverage". There is a large group of editors who interpret "significant coverage" as a high number of google results and Roger Mitchell did not record enough google results. Any article on William H. Watson is at risk of being deleted for exactly the same reason. Best wishes. Dormskirk (talk) 13:34, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
 * I suspect you may have been unlucky, and also suspect that innovation in accountancy is not an area in which many editors have much experience or knowledge (in contrast with, say, Pokemon characters). To some extent that's a reflection of the world we live in.  I expect the same problem could arise in relation to innovative soap chemists, but there's no harm in trying.   But having just noticed that you've created far more articles than me, you probably don't need my advice! Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:15, 9 September 2020 (UTC)

Global HQ
An IP keeps inserting "New York" as the headquarters of this company. Lever Brothers did have headquarters in various countries but its global HQ was in the UK, not the US. See [http://unilever-archives.com/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=GB1752.LBL#:~:text=Products%20are%20developed%2C%20manufactured%20and,which%20was%20formed%20in%201996. here]. Dormskirk (talk) 16:15, 31 August 2021 (UTC)