Talk:Thaddeus S. C. Lowe

older comments
The main editor of this article has received the Original Barnstar Award for biographies, in particular this one.--Magi Media 03:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Rating article
I really enjoyed reading this article. It's informative, the writing flows, the tone is in keeping with the subject and time period, and it's well researched. I would recommend requesting a peer review and then submitting it for Featured Article status. Having another set of eyes on the article helps assure the objectivity of the article and helps find all of those pesky little Wiki details. Excellent work! Nightngle 15:15, 7 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you for those kind words--Magi Media 06:38, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Not so great web sites
I must warn readers about two misinformative web sites:


 * The California State Military Museum
 * Thaddeus Civil War Biography Page

These two sites seem to be borrowing information from each other that's not totally correct. Magi Media 03:53, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Magi Media

Although, this is a good article, note the error under the photograph in the section on the Mount Lowe Railway. The name of the hymn must have been "Nearer My God to Thee," a popular hymn of that era. L. Thomas W. 16:46, 23 April 2007 (UTC) L. Thomas W. 4/23/07
 * Good catch. -Will Beback · † · 20:37, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Good catch indeed, and that was the song indeed. Thanks.--Magi Media 02:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

GA hold

 * 1) The lead of this article may be too long for an article with 27K of prose. See if you can trim it. Note, the lead is for summarizing the rest of the article, and should not introduce new topics not discussed in the rest of the article, as per WP:LEAD.
 * 2) Consider adding more links to the article
 * Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), there should be a non-breaking space -  between a number and the unit of measurement. For example, instead of 4 mm, use 4 mm, which when you are editing the page, should look like: 4&amp;nbsp;mm.
 * 1) Years with full dates should be linked; for example, link January 15, 2006.
 * 2) The article has spotted the following contraction: hadn't, if these are outside of quotations, they should be expanded.
 * 3) wikilink decades, such as 1850s.
 * 4) Footnotes come after punctation the vast majority of the time, not in the middle of a sentence.
 * 5) The Fair Oaks picture is too big, dominating that section. Cut its display size
 * 6) Most of the footnotes come from just a couple of different sources. See if you can find more. Are there any web refs avail?
 * 7) Ref 33, on Rand McNally, is a wiki article, you can't use these for refs, pls find another to replace it.
 * 8) You have 5 days to fix these. (forgot to sign before)Sumoeagle179 02:20, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
 * PS, leave note here when done. Sumoeagle179 02:20, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Failed GA, no response to issues.Sumoeagle179 23:09, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

GA Response
The lead of the article can be shortened, I suppose. I would have to rip the article off the site and put in a a word document for editing the tidbits you point out.

Two things about the links to this article. As is noted in a section above, other web sites which speak of Prof. Lowe are seriously erroneous. I found one that is worthy of linking. I am a professed authority on Prof. Thaddeus Lowe. I have written and spoken of him many times. I have portrayed him at graveside in cemetery tours. Only two biographies of any repute have been written on him and they are the two most cited in the article, and even at that there are contradictions in their interpretations. More books were written on his exploits as the commander of the Union Army Balloon Corps, and that wiki article is mine. Also the Mount Lowe Railway, and that article is chiefly mine.

The McNally link is weak, but I have yet to find sufficient reference to him. What he brought to Pasadena is mostly steeped in lore.

As winter draws near and my activities slow a little, I will look at editing this article for the nits you have pointed out.

Thank you.--Magi Media 00:32, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

He knew about the Jet Stream?
How? The first person credited with discovering it found it in the 1920s, after his death. In an NPR article, it is mentioned that Joseph Henry proposed an idea involving the jet stream in the 19th century, which also has not be proved with a reference. Whether it was Joseph Henry or a Japanese citizen in the 1920s who knew/theorized the idea of the jet stream, that rules this person out. Thegreatdr (talk) 20:18, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

The top three balloonists of the period all recognized a high wind that blew eastwardly and was possibly capable of flying them to Europe. Because of Lowe's extensive scientific analysis that was well recognized by scientists of the day, and his actual riding of the wind in the Cincinnati to South Carolina episode, he is best attributed as the discoverer of the Jet Stream, eventhough he did not name it as such.--Magi Media (talk) 17:40, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Constantine instead of Coulincourt
Milestones of Flight by Michael J.H. Taylor states that the C is for Constantine. Worth being checked. --Mezod (talk) 15:50, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Reference to picture
At one point, the article refers to a picture by its location within the article (The picture to the right depicts Lowe's ascent...). In principle, I don't object, but I suspect that was written before the widespread use of mobile versions of wikipedia. Are we sure that the mobile formatting doesn't change picture placement in such a way as to make that reference incoherent? Abeoriole88 (talk) 02:01, 10 May 2015 (UTC)


 * You're right, text that refers to an image should generally be in an image caption (see WP:MOSIM). I made some changes. --jnkyrdsprkl (talk) 03:34, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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CO2 refrigeration
I think it would be useful to expand on the refrigeration by Lowe. I believe he did experiment with both ammonia and co2 based systems. And did also made dry ice for ice making and easy storage in a room. But I am not sure if the machine to produce dry ice was ammonia or co2 based. 2A02:168:F609:0:5F8:C25A:2F16:ECD5 (talk) 14:49, 26 June 2019 (UTC)