Talk:Rossa Matilda Richter

to do list, and sorting out some of contradictory information
As I guess might be expected of a subject from the late 19th century about which many people wrote in spectacular terms, there's some variation in some of the facts. Trying to sort it out here.
 * Was she 14, 15, or 16 in 1877? Most seem to say 14.
 * Her 1891 accident was from a high-wire or from a cannon. Seems to be high-wire according to the original sources (i.e. the newer ones look like they got it wrong).
 * The dates and chronology of some of her early performances are iffy. Trying to get access to an 1879 interview her father gave...
 * Got the interview. I'm inclined to believe it's details, given the source. Debut at the Raglan Music Hall, not Drury Lane, but performed subsequently at the Drury Lane. Engaged for the latter by someone named Cormack -- possibly the same person another source called "Commack" (connected with ballet lessons taken at the same time)? deferring to the father in this case.

&mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 05:03, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
 * the Clipper says she went on tour with a Japanese troupe. (1) what kind of troupe. acrobatics? gymnastics? (2) Her father says it was a "troupe of Siamese acrobats".
 * did the bill make it through Parliament eventually? (find this, also see here)
 * can't find an obituary for her, or even a cause of death!
 * I have not seen a record of the name she used after getting married. In nearly all cases when not referring to her as Zazel, or by her birth name in the past tense, she unfortunately seems to be called "Mrs. George Starr." One might presume that her name became "Rossa Matilda Starr," but I have found no sources which use that name hence I've just omitted it.

I realize the newspaper article says "she was known as the only Japanese girl that ever visited Europe," but since she was English, this seems like an odd observation for the paper to make (and a confusing one for Wikipedia to include). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.49.254.118 (talk) 01:03, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

RM at Zazel
I have proposed to move Zazel to that film's full name here: Talk:Zazel. I am not proposing moving this title, but to turn Zazel into a dab page that links to this and others. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 17:18, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

organization
Thinking about organization. "Later life" is very short.

"Accidents" may not need to be its own section. Better to smooth it into the rest of the career section to create a neater narrative? ✅

"Image and legacy" is a little clumsy at the moment. The material seems important, since those are the kinds of historical contexts in which a lot of the more recent sources talk about her, but I'm not sure whether to put them in a section like this or spread them out to the other sections. If it were merged into the others, what should happen to mention of the movie with a character based on her? &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 02:58, 9 August 2018 (UTC)

Age, name and marriage
Regarding her age, she was definitely born in April 1860. She appears on the 1861 census as an infant aged 11 months. Her exact date of birth is either 7 or 14 April 1860. According to her baptism record (accessed via Ancestry.co.uk on 31 August 2021) she was born on 7 April 1860. The baptism took place on 6 November 1870 at Christ Church, Albany Street, Camden. The record includes her date of birth. However, a US Registration of Widows declaration dated 1915 states that her date of birth was 14 April 1860 and is signed by Rosa herself. She was therefore 17, not 14, when she made her debut as the Human Cannonball.

Regarding her name, as far as I can see only the 1871 census spells her name as 'Rossa.' All other official sources - of which there are a great many - spell her name as 'Rosa.' I suggest changing the title of her Wikipedia entry to this more usual spelling of the name.

Regarding her marriage, she only married George Starr in 1912, although they had by this point been living as man and wife for many years. Their marriage took place on 14 October 1912 in Salem, Massachusetts. According to the official record (accessed via Ancestry.co.uk on 31 August 2021) this was her first marriage and his second marriage. The couple probably had to wait for his first wife to die before they could be officially married.

Jabezjabez (talk) 15:26, 31 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks for doing this research. A few questions/comments: first, could you flesh out the references more? I see "accessed via Ancestry.co.uk" but there's no direct url there. Second, it's tricky business to use primary historical documents on Wikipedia. We typically base articles on independent secondary sourcing whenever possible. The idea is that the journalists, academics, etc. who write about the subject are the ones who should be doing the fact-checking, not Wikipedians, per our policies on original research and verifiability. Based on the kinds of press she received and the field she was in, it certainly wouldn't be surprising if a younger age was given and printed as such, but when I went through all the rest of the sources (granted it was a couple years ago now) none of them gave the date you found. So it puts us in a tough spot. That said, obviously we want to get it right. So we may want to stick with what the secondary sources say, but put the material you've found in a footnote. Or include some context about the conflicting information in the early life section? What do you think? &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 19:20, 31 August 2021 (UTC)
 * As for naming, Wikipedia uses the name most commonly used in reliable sources, regardless of legal spelling, so I think the main options are Rossa Matilda Richter or Zazel. Since there have been other Zazels, the former still makes sense to me. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 19:21, 31 August 2021 (UTC)

Many thanks for your thoughtful reply. The trouble with adding the URL is that the information is behind a paywall, so any URL would only lead to Ancestry's homepage, not the relevant information. Elsewhere in the article there's info derived from a Daily Mirror article of 1938. The URL in the footnote just leads to the Wikipedia page for the Daily Mirror. I really don't see the point of that. But perhaps to comply with best Wiki practice I ought to add a URL leading to Ancestry's homepage, with a note that it's a subscription website. I'll be guided by your experience and decision.

Regarding her date of birth, I think we have a duty to provide the correct one. Wikipedia is most people's first port of call for information about her and they take whatever is said here as Gospel, without checking it for themselves. The misinformation about her starting her career as a 14 year old is already ALL over the Internet. Even the British Library repeats the canard. Several people - including the Wikipedia article itself - write about her posters sexualising her. Her correct age is key for putting this in context. Regarding her name, everyone spells her name 'Rossa' because that's how Wikipedia spells it. Wikipedia's error has created the situation in which that is the form of the name most commonly used. Having said that, I can (just) see the argument for letting it stand, but I would suggest adding a footnote that the spelling is based on one enumerator's mistake at the time of the 1871 census and that it is not the spelling used by Zazel herself, though that will inevitably raise the question in most people's minds: then why perpetuate it?

Personally, I would prefer the title of her article to read 'Zazel the Human Cannonball,' since far more people, then and now, knew/know her by that name. But since an Internet search for 'Zazel' brings up Wiki's disambiguation page, I suppose it doesn't really matter.

I was aware that Wikipedia prefers secondary sources but I find it extremely frustrating that one cannot include correct, verifiable information simply because it hasn't been published elsewhere yet. This stricture is particularly onerous when writing about a relatively obscure figure like Zazel, where secondary sources are few and far between. I just had a look at two less obscure figures: at random I chose Disraeli and Palmerston. Both Wiki articles give their precise dates of birth, as one would expect, but neither cites a source for the information. Could Zazel's article not follow this pattern too? Once again, I'll be guided by you. You're clearly a far more experience editor than I am.

Jabezjabez (talk) 14:19, 3 September 2021 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the delay responding to this.
 * The trouble with adding the URL is that the information is behind a paywall, so any URL would only lead to Ancestry's homepage, not the relevant information Generally speaking, adding links to paywalled content is ok. There's even a template you can add to the end of the citation: paywall. The only time I omitted a url in the existing sources, assuming it wasn't by accident, was where there was not only a paywall but where I couldn't find a url that would be functional at all. Ideally there's a link to any applicable Wikipedia article about the source in addition to the url to the source itself. WP:V is ultimately the most important thing, and that just requires putting in as much information as possible. After all, not all sources are digitized but we can still cite them.
 * I'd be curious to see the ancestry sources if you're feeling charitable and have a way to send a pdf (my email is on my user page).
 * we have a duty to provide the correct one - I think there's a good argument to do so in some fashion, yes. Always worth keeping in mind that fun adage on Wikipedia: "verifiability, not truth".
 * everyone spells her name 'Rossa' because that's how Wikipedia spells it - this much is incorrect. It's possible there are some sources which are based on Wikipedia, but the article was based on the available sources. That said, doing a spot check just now, there are more than I remember that say Rosa, so it's possible a page move is in order. I'll take a closer look in the next couple days. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 05:03, 8 September 2021 (UTC)