Talk:Madison Square Garden (1879)

Incorrect date on photo
The date given with the included photo is 1876, but the article states the building was renamed MSG in 1879. Anyone know which is true? Elsquared (talk) 02:56, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The date on the photo was incorrect. I've fixed it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:33, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

On velodromes and carpenters' salaries
Re: "A Final Renaming" section. The fifth sentence of the second paragraph is this statement, "A velodrome circuit flourished around the country, with the best racers earning $100,000 to $150,000 a year at a time when carpenters were lucky to make $5,000." ...Really ?. Even if one is not knowledgeable about U.S. labor wages at the turn of the 20th century, which the creator of this section clearly was not, it would seem to be common sense to realize that there was no way in hell carpenters were making 5k a year in that era. The reference given for this piece of fiction is a April 29th,2007 N.Y.Times article on fixed gear bikes titled "Unstoppable" written by the author of "The Answer Is Never: A Skateboarders History of the world",which of course does not include a reference for this bit of stupidity.

A quick search of   "Carpenters Wages 1900"   turned up a PDF of a chapter titled, " Wage Trends, 1800-1900 " from a book published by Princeton University Press in 1960 titled  " Trends in the American Economy in the Nineteenth Century." (ISBN: 0-870-14180-5) Page 45 of this PDF, (page 492 of the book) give the wages for carpenters in the 1899-1901 era at around $608 to $716 per year,assuming a carpenter worked all year. (and if you've ever worked in the trades you know this is unlikely.) A far cry from the stated 5k. As to the figure given for bicycle racers,this too seems dubious given that the source is a Newspaper article about modern day bike riders in N.Y.C. written by an author who's apparent main claim to creditability at the time of publication was a book related to skateboarding. Hardly a reliable source on economic facts 11 and a half decades ago...

I question why this paragraph needs to exist, the first and last sentence could be incorporated into the first paragraph. The subject of the section is renaming the venue,not a history of velodrome bicycle racing circa 1900. In any case sentences 2-5 of this paragraph are a direct verbatim lifting from the N.Y.Times article referenced. I seem to remember a wiki rule against copying others work in that manner.Jonel469 (talk) 12:33, 15 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Well, defintiely fix the copyvio, and remove anything which is not supported by the citation. As for the numbers - given the apparent confusion, and the fact that they're not really related to the putative topic, I would think taking them out would be fine as well. BMK (talk) 21:15, 15 February 2015 (UTC)