Talk:Willamette River/Archive 2

Course description
I added a substantial course description recently as a separate article, Course of the Willamette River, and summarized it for this article. I'm working on a longish discharge subsection to add to the Course article. When that's done, I'll summarize it for this article, trying to retain anything essential from the existing "Discharge" subsection. As User:Shannon1 has noted in the "Flooding" section, the river was much wilder before construction of the dams. Its modern floods have been tame by comparison to several in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Finetooth (talk) 04:41, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Additions, dead url
I've finally added something about fish, birds, and reptiles. Ran the dab checker and fixed the remaining dabs. Ran the dead url checker and fixed two. The only one that's not fixed is citation 73. The source citation is not archived, and I haven't found a suitable substitute online. Two options: (1) the claim could be deleted or (2) someone might be able to track down another reliable source. Finetooth (talk) 20:27, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ The original citation referred to an online part of a print book. I just replaced it with a citation for the book itself. I found the citation info. here. Jsayre64 (talk) 00:40, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Um haha I replaced that ref before you did... don't know if you noticed... but it's all good. Shannon  talk   contribs  01:38, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, you did, but you mixed up the citation information and used the same ref twice. It's better to have diverse sources, so I fixed it up. :-) Jsayre64 (talk) 01:55, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Pre-GA review work?
While we're waiting for the GA review to start, do any of you have any other suggestions about what could be done so that the GA review goes more smoothly? Jsayre64 (talk) 22:19, 23 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Since the lead is intended to be a summary or abstract of the whole article, it should at least mention geology, floods, flora and fauna, pollution, and bridges. For an article this long, a four-paragraph lead would be OK. To make everything fit neatly into four paragraphs, though, it might be necessary to do some other fiddling. Finetooth (talk) 23:47, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Alright. I expanded the lead (among other fixes), and now it's six paragraphs long. The last two paragraphs are each pretty short, though. Does it look good? Jsayre64 (talk) 04:26, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * You've got the basics there, but I'd like to make a few alterations. I mostly fly by the seat of my pants on these things and don't follow a cookbook, but one thing from WP:LEAD I've had pointed out to me several times is this sentence: "As a general guideline, the lead should be no longer than four paragraphs." I'll take a crack at further revisions tomorrow when I'm wide awake. Finetooth (talk) 05:59, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Wow, you sure have a talent for that sort of work! I'll get to the redundant links I found soon. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 17:11, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Lots of practice is the main reason. Thanks for your help with the article, and feel free to tinker further. Like everybody else, I don't see everything, and I make mistakes. I did notice a couple of other things as I wandered through the text again. I think the article has a good chance at GA without major changes, but to get to FA it needs to be comprehensive without going into unnecessary detail. The "History" section stops abruptly at the end of the 19th century and should probably include a brief summary of the major changes since 1900. Also, maybe something should be included about parks, greenways, and habitat restoration for an FA run. Finetooth (talk) 17:31, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

A significant part of the "pollution" section is devoted to the 20th century. Therefore it also counts as history (and it sounds like history, too, when you read it). That's just not made very clear in the article. Tedder told me what he thought could be improved within the "history" section:
 * My opinion is the steamship era is covered too lightly; the ships and monopolies on the columbia/willamette were a big deal, which led to some of the toll roads to eastern Washington/Oregon and influenced the development of rail.

Oh, and I changed a lot of the ref style as well as added more information and did general fixes. I hope I didn't mess anything up. --<b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 21:45, 24 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Tedder's probably right. On a different matter, though, I doubt that this is a good change: "Today, the average flow at the mouth has declined to 32,000 cubic feet per second (910 m3/s), although that now ranks 13th in volume among rivers in the continental United States. The river is responsible for 15 percent of the Columbia's flow." First, what is meant by "today"? How do we know that the Oregon Encyclopedia information is more recent than 1990? Second, a decline of 400 cubic feet per second out of 32,000 feet per second seems insignificant; it could just be a matter of rounding. Third, if you make the claim that the Willamette was 19th in volume in 1990 but has risen to 13th in 2011, you need to explain how that can be. Otherwise, it will just strike readers as strange. Finetooth (talk) 22:31, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Another problem. In the discharge section, you changed the maximum discharge claim for the Morrison Bridge gauge from 420,000 cubic feet per second to 460,000 feet per second, but that is not supported by the USGS source I originally cited in support of the claim. You added a second citation, to the Robbins article in the Oregon Encyclopedia in support of the revised claim, but now the two sources contradict one another, and there's no reason to assume that Robbins is a more reliable source than the USGS. Would you mind reverting this change? Finetooth (talk) 22:50, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I must admit I agree with you now on that first issue. As for the second, let me explain. Robbins wrote that, in January 1996, the discharge was recorded at 460,000 ft.3/sec. That's a greater discharge than what the article said before: 420,000 ft.3/sec. (recorded on February 9, 1996), so basically I updated the maximum. Here are the changes I made. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 00:24, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Not to put too fine a point on it, but Robbins says, "The peak river flow during the floods of late January 1996 was estimated at about 460,000 cfs at Portland." The USGS gauge was operating in January, yet the USGS lists the slightly smaller February figure as the maximum. The claim in the article says, "The maximum flow recorded at this station... ", but the USGS document does not support the Robbins maximum. It appears to me that Robbins did not get his maximum number from this station but was citing an "estimate" from elsewhere. Does this make sense? Finetooth (talk) 02:23, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I found the answer. In this book, which was published in 2009, it says that "the river is estimated to have reached 460,000 cfs in the February 1996 flood." So it was actually in February, not January. I'll update this in the article in a moment, and I'll make a note that it's an estimate. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 02:39, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Travis is giving an estimate for the discharge at the confluence, which, all other things being equal, would be larger than at the Morrison Bridge gauge because the river gets bigger as it receives more surface flow and tributaries. Would adding a sentence resolve the problem, like this: "The maximum flow at this station was 420000 cuft/s on February 9, 1996, during the Willamette Valley Flood of 1996, and the minimum was 4200 cuft/s on July 10, 1978. During the flood, the estimated flow at the mouth of the river was slightly larger, 460000 cuft/s." Ref the first sentence to the USGS and the second sentence to Travis. Or, perhaps better for the prose flow in the main text, I could add the estimated flow at the mouth as Note 2, supported by a ref to Travis. I'd be glad to do the note work if this solution seems better than adding another in-text sentence. Finetooth (talk) 03:42, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, a further confusion is that the Willamette splits at Sauvie Island and loses part of itself. I thus doubt that the flow at the mouth would be as big as at the Morrison Bridge. Add the complications of tidal fluctuations and possible backflow from a flooding Columbia and ugh! Sigh. You see why I want to stick with the gauge numbers? Finetooth (talk) 03:49, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, now I do, and I have put this issue to bed. You have persuaded me to remove all mentions of 460,000 cfs as the maximum. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 15:12, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I woke up in the middle of the night thinking maybe I was being too stubborn and that we should just go with Shannon's 1861 maximum or list all three with explanatory notes or add them up and divide by three... :-) Finetooth (talk) 16:36, 25 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I still contend that the max discharge should be 635,000 cfs. The 1862 flood did happen, and it's not like there's no reliable source for that figure, either. Shannon  talk   contribs  23:13, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Shannon, the next sentence in the article says, "According to the the USACE, the highest recorded flow of 635,000 cubic feet per second (18,000 m3/s) for the Willamette at Portland occurred during a flood in 1861." Isn't that OK? Finetooth (talk) 23:42, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I do see the minor problem of the date, 1861 or 1862, but the source says 1861. It's the Wikipedia article (Great Flood of 1862) that says 1862. By arriving in December and hanging around until January, the flood overlapped the two years. Finetooth (talk) 23:48, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I mean, in the geobox. Shannon  talk   contribs  23:55, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Note 1 in the geobox explains the situation in this way: "These are the average, maximum, and minimum flows recorded during the period of record (1972–2009 ) for this gauge.[5] The greatest recorded Willamette flood, which occurred in 1861, produced a much larger maximum of 635,000 cubic feet per second (18,000 m3/s) in Portland." Do we need something more? Finetooth (talk) 00:10, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, and after reading above, I apologize about the lack of information in the history section. I could add some things if I hav time. Shannon  talk   contribs  23:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * No need to apologize. You did almost all of the work on the history section, a great deal of work it looks like. Finetooth (talk) 00:10, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah I guess that's fine, if you're only going to use one reference for discharge in the geobox... but just saying, on the San Joaquin River article, I used Rivers of North America for the average discharge, a 1900s California state engineering record for the peak flow, and a USGS gage for the min flow. Just thought it's worth a mention. It's kinda funny. Shannon  talk   contribs  07:19, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I've gotten into quite a few complications like that with the rivers lists. Sometimes a single RS like Rivers of North America will have part of the needed data but not all of it. In the case of the San Joaquin, though, didn't the gauge records include all three stats? Finetooth (talk) 16:36, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Nope, it didn't include a reliable looking peak flow number – 79,000 cfs is way too low for a river that size. The Tuolumne alone has been recorded to exceed 130,000 cfs... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shannon1 (talk • contribs) 19:11, 25 June 2011
 * What you are saying makes me think that for every big river article it would be worthwhile, when possible, to list the modern peak flow recorded by the lowermost stream gauge or by some other method for at or near the mouth, but also an RS estimate of the peak historic flow. You've probably been doing that already. I think I have done it only occasionally. Finetooth (talk) 19:47, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Exactly... considering that the NWIS really isn't the only reliable source for American rivers. With the Willamette, a very large river,it's fortunate that the USGS has a gauge close to the mouth recording discharge, but in other cases, like the San Joaquin the lowermost gauge doesn't include the flow of the Mokelumne, its second largest tributary, and on the Columbia the closest gauge to the mouth recording cfs is at the Dalles, 200 miles upstream, for heavens sake. Shannºn   Talk   20:32, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Shannon1, I don't understand the last part of your comment. Isn't the Beaver Army Terminal a well downstream gauge for the Columbia?  It is located here according to the USGS info here. —EncMstr (talk) 05:53, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Hopefully the review will start soon! See here. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 15:24, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Abbreviation for page and pages
The correct abbreviation for a single page is p., but for multiple pages it is pp. See the reference section of any featured article at WP:FA for examples. It's no doubt in the Manual of Style too, but I'm not sure exactly where. Finetooth (talk) 23:03, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Alphabetical order
The "Works cited" section should be kept in alphabetical order. Finetooth (talk) 23:07, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Further research on flooding
I just discovered there is a good deal of news coverage about the Willamette's floods. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 23:15, 25 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your continuing efforts. My notes above were abrupt because I had to hurry away to do real-life things. Finetooth (talk) 02:09, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Me too. To make the research easier for each of us, here is a link to news articles that were published between 1996 and 1997 and that include the additional search terms "flood" and "1996." <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 02:16, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Do we need more about the floods? Shannon might like to weigh in on this one. Finetooth (talk) 02:52, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Jsayre, so you won't have to guess, I should explain that Shannon and I split the work fairly evenly. Shannon did virtually everything on History, Flooding, and Engineering. I did Course, Watershed, Geology, Flora and fauna, and Bridges. Other editors had already done Pollution, to which I added the OWQI stuff. That's why I'd like Shannon's input on Flooding; I did none of the research or writing for that section. Finetooth (talk) 03:10, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I see. Was this slight expansion a good change? I'm not totally sure if the quote box was a good idea, but you've got to admit the quote is a pretty good one! I can add some more information about the 1996 flood if you want. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 03:28, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The quote is wonderful, memorable. I'd recommend (pending comments by Shannon) just using the quote once, embedded in the text, and removing the quote box. Just as a side note, I'll mention that the Manual of Style deprecates fancy quotes (the big blue ones) and recommends a variety of other options. I usually use blockquotes (which use no quotation marks) for anything longer than four lines and embed shorter quotations (inside regular quotation marks) in the text. These are not the only options. MOS:QUOTE discusses at least some of them. I have to disappear again, probably until tomorrow. Finetooth (talk) 03:44, 26 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Personally I like the big quotes. Finetooth when you were saying "more about the floods" were you suggesting a potential expansion of the entire section, or a bit more on the 1862 flood, or something regarding the max discharge in the geobox? Also I noted several changes between 420,000 and 460,000 cfs as the max discharge recorded by the USGS gage. (Just saying, 420,000 and 4,200 (max and min) have the same first four characters so it might cosmetically look better to put 635,000 instead.) Shannºn   Talk   03:43, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, these talk-page discussions tend to meander sometimes and are hard to follow. Here are three responses to your three questions and comments:


 * Since Jsayre, not knowing that you'd done the History, suggested doing more research and writing related to the History, my intent was to hand that off to you. You may not have any strong feelings about changes that Jsayre makes to the History section, and that's fine. Or you might want to weigh in, and that's fine too.


 * I've explained why I prefer using the Morrison Bridge gauge numbers, but it's not a case of "my way or the highway". Another reasonable solution would be to use the historic maximum in the geobox with a note that explains the modern maximum and the reason(s) for the difference between the two. If you and Jsayre think that (or something else) is best, go for it. The way the numbers are presented will probably not be a sticking point during the GA so long as whatever is there makes sense to readers and is verifiable.


 * My case about the fancy quotes is based on my reading of WP:MOSQUOTE, but it may be a faulty reading. Pull quotes like this one may be OK sometimes. If you decide to keep the pull quote, it would be better to move it up a bit so that it does not overlap the section boundary. Finetooth (talk) 17:29, 27 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Oh, I've got absolutely no opposition (or control - WP:OWN) over the History section. I'd love to see it in a more complete status, and I might have to tweak the second section heading, as it doesn't seem very gramatically correct.


 * Also, despite my preference for the fancy quotes, I do think I remember in a PR a while back, I was told that those quotes would probably not pass a FAC, but again I'm not sure, and this isn't a FAC (oh boy- those are tough, for me but probably not for you), it's a GAN. Shannºn   Talk   21:50, 27 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The FAs are tough for me too. At least three to which I was a major contributor did not pass and have not yet passed. Fortunately, I've had some success with others that offset the flops. Finetooth (talk) 02:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC)


 * There already is a footnote in the geobox about the 635,000 cfs discharge that was recorded.
 * I moved the rquote up as you suggested, Finetooth. I can add a little more about the 1996 flooding and some about the 1964 flooding tonight and/or tomorrow. --<b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 23:49, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
 * All is well. Finetooth (talk) 02:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Now I've used pretty much all of Google News' free archives for information about the two most recent floods. I could add some more about the 19th-century flooding a bit later. Some help is appreciated! :-) <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 16:46, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Gov. McCall's cleanup
See here, here, and here for related information. I'll integrate some of this soon. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 15:48, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Thoughts from peer review
I figured we should discuss here the possibility of an FA nomination once all the peer review issues are addressed.

I support the idea of moving the "bridges" section to a level 3 header under the "engineering" section. I know that Shannon has been inactive for the past week, but I recall that during the GA review she said that "dams and bridges should go together as subsections in another large section." I assume that large section would be Engineering. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 19:18, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I performed the move. The peer review also made me realize that the idea of a "20th-century events" section may not have been a good one. As the reviewer pointed out, the "flooding" section includes information about flooding in the 19th and 21st centuries as well, and the "pollution" section is not just about the 20th century. We may in fact need to give these topics their own respective sections after all. The peer reviewer also introduced the idea of placing the "Big Pipe" section under the "engineering" section, although it is now a subsection of "pollution." Confusing? Definitely. But I agree that there is certainly a section-arrangement problem in this article, and I'm wondering how best to address this in order to get the article ready enough for a shot at FA. Thoughts? <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 00:01, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it's helpful on any article to have one editor who is more-or-less in charge even if multiple editors make contributions off-and-on right up to the FA level. Although I worked a lot on this article, I never felt ready to lead the way to GA or FA. On the other hand, I'd be glad to continue to help if either you or Shannon want to push on. This would be similar to how Columbia River advanced to FA. At least a half-dozen editors made significant contributions, but led the way and made the nomination at FAC.


 * Before I began to work on the article, quite some time ago, it already had a large Big Pipe section. I didn't meddle with it much, but I've always thought that it was given too much emphasis. Even though the article is now much more complete, I still think the Big Pipe material should be given less emphasis; it's merely one project at one point in the river at one point in time. I think it's gotten over-big attention here because it's recent. Perhaps Big Pipe could be reduced to a paragraph and added to the bottom of the History section but preceded in the "History" section by material about 20th century dam and seawall building (starting with "In the early 20th century, major river-control projects had begun to take place... ") from the "Flooding" section, which I agree should be its own section. This will raise further writing and organizational complications, but basically I think it might work to move parts of other sections into the bottom of the History section so that History flows more naturally through the last 100 years. Possibly the last paragraph of the "Engineering" section could be moved to "History". "Flooding" and "Engineering" would, as a result, become somewhat shorter. If the last paragraph of the "Engineering" section were moved up to near the bottom of "History", the "Engineering" section and "Bridges" subsection could become a single section called "Dams and bridges".


 * Other changes that I might make would be to move Geology up to just below "Course" since geology precedes history chronologically. Then I'd rearrange the other sections thus: "History," "Dams and bridges", "Flooding", "Pollution", and "Flora and fauna", in that order. I'd also hunt for redundancy and weed it out so that "History", "Flooding", and "Pollution" do not repeat one another except to make smooth transitions.


 * To be comprehensive, the article probably needs to say something about recreation: fishing, riverside parks, boating (perhaps including dragonboat racing or other boat racing), dinner cruises, swimming (if any), and perhaps other things I haven't thought of or don't know about. This all might amount to only another paragraph of stuff. If so, it too might fit nicely into the 20th-century part of the "History" section. Just my thoughts. Finetooth (talk) 17:08, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * That sounds good overall. I moved the "geology" section to directly below the "course" section as you suggested. I'll look into this a bit more closely later, though. I noticed that the Columbia River article doesn't have a "history" section at all; we could split it up the "history" section of this article somehow and solve its clutter problem. Anyway, I'll write down some more thoughts later. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 00:58, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * OK. I split "Flooding" off as its own level-2 section and I integrated "Bridges" into "Engineering" and changed level-2 "Engineering" to "Dams and bridges" (with no level-3 sections in it). I also had to significantly shrink the size of the images in the "Flooding" section in order to keep the rquote within that section. I'll try to remove some redundancy if I find any, and I'll do the best I can to shorten and summarize the Big Pipe project information. But there a couple of questions that I need you to respond to for me:


 * Where exactly should the 3rd paragraph of "Dams and bridges" be moved?
 * Where exactly should the 4th paragraph of "Flooding" (besides the first sentence) be moved?
 * Where exactly should "Big Pipe" be moved?
 * Did I mess up your proposed section order?


 * Thanks for your input. Hopefully we'll get this problem solved soon. --<b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 02:23, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry. I think I tried to cover too much ground in one note. I moved the wide image back to the bottom and tinkered a bit with the layout again. Please revert any changes you don't agree with. I'll come back tomorrow morning and try to give sensible answers to your four questions. I might answer them by moving things around to see if my notions work or not; sometimes they don't. Meanwhile, I've made an appointment for late tomorrow morning to get let into the First Christian Church to try to get photos of the Povey windows for Povey Brothers Studio, and I have some other non-Wikipedia things I have to do. Finetooth (talk) 03:45, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Partly done. I worked quickly and tried not to mangle anything. I'm out of time this morning, but I'll take another look later, maybe today, maybe not until Wednesday. Meanwhile, whack away. Nothing is lost, and everything can be changed and changed again. Finetooth (talk) 18:00, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Great work! You cleaned up all the clutter in the "history" section. I'm going to see if the article complies with the whole manual of style and has no weasel words. I'll make some edits if necessary. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 19:35, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I'm not done looking through the article yet, but I noticed this citation that refers to a book that doesn't appear in the "works cited" section. Do you know what this might refer to? <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 19:51, 2 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Just a couple thoughts after skimming the above, espcially the last paragraph. From my original research, I can say that the Willamette at Salem has formal river access downtown (boat ramp on one side, dock on the other) in two parks, as well as other points within the city limits, dragonboat racing in June, a dinner cruise sternwheeler, and that's just off the top of my head. Keizer also has at least two parks with formal river access (by formal I mean anything other than "let's scramble down the bank"). Maybe we could start a list on the talk page that includes the amenities at each major city and then fill in the smaller cities and other communities, which we could then summarize, "prosify" and add to the article. We could start with personal knowledge backed up with citations, then branch out from there. Valfontis (talk) 20:00, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Cool. What I'm thinking of is not a complete list but a kind of summary, using examples to illustrate points; i.e., sentences that say things like "dragonboat races such as the X in Salem, county parks such as Y in Somewhere, and Hoo-Hah State Park at the confluence of Terribly Cold Creek with the Willamette". I'm overstating the squashing a bit perhaps, but the list of parks alone is fairly enormous; I compiled a partial (but very scattered) list while doing the cuckoo course description at Course of the Willamette River. Doing that one might have pushed me over the edge. :-) By the way, I hope you see the note above about my pursuit of Povey Glass images. Wish me luck. Finetooth (talk) 03:45, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * "Hoo-Hah State Park at the confluence of Terribly Cold Creek" I think that's in Lane County. Would Willamette Greenway be able to contain the parks more easily? Not all the parks are part of the greenway (technically maybe they are?), and not all of the accessible bits of greenway are parklike (more swamplike), but there may be some overlap. Yay Povey! Here's to the sun being out! Valfontis (talk) 23:45, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * About the stray citation, I might know what book that's for, but I'll have to do a bit of looking around. You know, considering I wrote the section a long time ago, so I can't take it off the top of my head now. And generally, large river articles tend not to have a history section. I don't know where the Willamette falls though. It's kind of in the middle. Though following a model like San Joaquin River would be nice, as the two rivers are pretty similarly in size (except for discharge). Shann º n   22:25, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Loose ends
I thought I'd start a new section before the one above gets too complicated to follow. Here are some remaining problems, ideas.
 * 's mention of the Willamette Greenway led me in a roundabout way to an article already cited by . It's the Willamette River Recreation Guide. I think I can compile a good short Recreation section from this document alone; that might take me a couple of days to get around to, so if somebody else wants to do it, that's fine.
 * Done. Added to the 20th and 21st-century subsection of "History". Finetooth (talk) 18:42, 4 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't know what the stray citation to Wilkes refers to, but maybe Shannon will figure it out. If not, maybe another source can be found that supports the claims.
 * <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 23:49, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I added an Osprey image to "Flora and fauna", but "Pollution" needs an image as well. I've been thinking of going to the Canby Ferry and taking some pictures there (at the site of one of the pollution readings), but lots of other things might work.
 * Added image. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 03:38, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Citation 109 doesn't seem to work; even the archived URL leads to a dead end.
 * Fixed. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 03:38, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * The last paragraph of the 19th-century subsection of "History" mentions Bachelor's Island. Where is it? I can't find it on road maps or topo maps. If none of us can find it, I'd suggest using a weasel like "upstream of Ross Island" and giving the river mileage for Ross Island. Finetooth (talk) 19:02, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Shannon found the book "Wilkes" referred to and I fixed citation 109. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 19:12, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * The edition, place of publication, and OCLC or ISBN should be added to the Wilkes citation. The one above Wilkes (Timmin) has an ISBN that does not seem valid, or the publication date is wrong. The FAC reviewers look closely at everything, including stuff like this. The ISBNs without hyphens should include them. A handy conversion tool lives here; it doesn't recognize the Timmin ISBN. WorldCat is good for looking up things like editions and OCLCs. Hopefully, Shannon will be able to say which edition she was citing. I didn't check the whole list of books, so other things like this might be lurking in a few entries. Finetooth (talk) 19:51, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I did some more tidying in the section. Indeed, there are several volumes of the Wilkes book. In fact, there are at least fifteen. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 01:32, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * An image of the Tom McCall Waterfront Park seemed to belong in the "pollution" section (given McCall's cleanup effort and how polluted the river is around there), so I added it. There's still space for at least one more, but I can't find a good photo online that isn't copyrighted. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 01:55, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Good choice, better than Canby Ferry in terms of relevance to the Pollution section. Finetooth (talk) 16:44, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * The Bachelor's Island mystery got me curious. After a bit of searching I found it, in the Columbia, Washington, not Oregon. . Topo map. This book has some info about Rockwell's survey, and mentions Bachelor's Island, "in the Columbia", about 24 miles downstream from the "foot of Ross Island", in the Willamette. WP's Bachelor Island page is about an island in Massachusetts. Perhaps if I get a bit of time later today I'll make a little page for the Washington island. For now though, just posting these discoveries. Pfly (talk) 20:16, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay, made a stub of a page for the island and did a few edits to this page. Added a cite to that book linked above, but maybe it isn't needed. The cite template fields are rather messy. Maybe it should just be taken out. If not, I'll improve the cite in a little bit. Pfly (talk) 21:03, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks so much, Pfly. I was looking in the wrong river for Bachelor Island. Your new article is very helpful and interesting. Finetooth (talk) 16:44, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Shannon, I still see problems with the Wilkes and Timmin entries in the bibliography. None of the editions listed by WorldCat was published by Whittaker and Co. I discovered this when I was looking at WorldCat to try to find the location of the publisher; we need to add that missing detail before taking this to FAC. The Timmin entry is problematic because the Atglen, Pennsylvania, edition matches a publication date in the 1970s, but the ISBN is for the 2007 version. Do you have anything in your notes that would help sort these two inconsistencies out? Finetooth (talk) 17:39, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't know about Timmen (I don't think I was the one who cited it) but the Wilkes data was taken from the Google Books entry, and that doesn't have an ISBN which I presume is because of the age of the book. I think it's this one.  Shann º n   20:32, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. That's enough to solve the problems. I added a courtesy link to the Google version of the Wilkes entry and added a few details, including an OCLC number, for the Whittaker and Co. edition. With Timmen's I assumed good faith on the part of whoever cited the book and made the entry internally consistent with the Atglen edition. It's a source for only one non-controversial claim, so I don't think anyone will object to this. Finetooth (talk) 23:18, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Image license problems
I've just gone through a check of the image licenses in this article as I would if I were doing an image check at FAC. Most look fine to me, but it appears that the Corps of Engineers is migrating its web addresses, and that is causing problems with three of our images. In addition, the Corps site may be temporarily down during the migration.
 * File:Willamette River Flood, 1996.jpg has a dead source URL in the license. It's also a lesser image. Maybe we can find a better one.
 * I couldn't find a replacement link for the source. I was never particularly fond of the image anyway, so I removed it. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 19:32, 5 August 2011 (UTC)


 * File:USACE Detroit Dam Oregon.jpg. I am unable to connect via the given source links.
 * File:USACE Fremont Bridge Portland.jpg has four source links, but for the past two days I have been unable to get any of the first three to connect. The fourth one works. Perhaps the other three should be deleted from the license page. The fourth one links to a TIF file of 3.8 megabytes. I've converted it to a JPG of about 2 megabytes. The existing image in the article is 572 kilobytes, so I believe it would be better to replace the existing one with the bigger one. If no one objects, I will go ahead and do that and revise the license. It may be that the Corps is generally adding TIFs during its upgrade of its image site. Commons generally prefers the biggest file of any given image that's available. Maybe others besides the Fremont Bridge will become available in bigger sizes. Finetooth (talk) 16:14, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Now I have found a tif for the Detroit Dam image: here. Finetooth (talk) 16:46, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Are we done?
I don't see anything else that we haven't already discussed or fixed. Finetooth (talk) 23:27, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm going to finish adding OCLC numbers to the books in the "works cited" section. Once I've done that, I think the article will be ready. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 23:48, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅. Now off to see how to nominate the article for FA… <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 00:18, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Awesome. I'll keep my eye on it and see if I can help out. I wanted to help more on the process so far, but have only managed to poke a tiny bit here and there. And although the river is not that far from me, I am not very familiar with it, except in Portland a bit. In about a week I may be on vacation in Oregon, even if along the Willamette likely only driving... Pfly (talk) 08:58, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Strangeness in geobox
The link to the Clackamas tribe under etymology in the geobox displays strangely, anyone got a clue on how to fix that? (or has anyone noticed yet?) Shann º n   03:56, 16 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I noticed. I can't find out what's causing it, though, and it's a minor issue, so I would just ignore it. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 03:58, 16 August 2011 (UTC)
 * It looks normal on my screen. I guess that's why I didn't notice. Finetooth (talk) 05:47, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

FAC outcome
Unfortunately, it looks like the FAC was closed due to a lack of support. Looking over the FAC nomination subpage, the area where this article appeared not to meet the FA standards was the clarity and sentence fluency of the prose. After two weeks the article will be eligible for a second nomination. So, I am going to read the whole article again and copyedit it (again). I might bring some more thoughts or issues to the talk page here. After that: another peer review nomination? straight back to FAC? I'm sure some editors have strong opinions about this. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 20:28, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


 * My enthusiasm for spending more time on this particular article waned a long time ago. You've done a nice job of getting it up to GA, and I thought it had a pretty good chance of making FA this time around. However, I don't want to keep struggling with it. If you decide to press on, you might ask the two FAC reviewers if they have any advice about how to proceed. The first thing that reviewers will look at on a second round is what happened on the first round and whether the issues raised then have been addressed. Finetooth (talk) 18:19, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
 * IMO, the last FAC failed purely because of ignorance on the part of the reviewers and wasn't a problem for any of the nominators. Of course I tend to languish at FAC a lot, but this one really kind of makes me sad, as Jsayre obviously addressed all the problems brought up during the nomination. I say re nominate as soon as possible, but I might be wrong. Shann º n   03:24, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the sympathy. I noticed that the FAC delegate who closed the nomination on August 30 said that he/she was closing it because nobody had ever voted "support." The reason for that appears to be due to problems with the quality of the article's prose. So I copyedited the whole article, and if you and/or others think everything is OK, I'll take this back to FAC on Wednesday. <b style="font-family:Rockwell">Jsayre64</b> <b style="font-family:Rockwell">(talk)</b> 03:28, 13 September 2011 (UTC)