Talk:William Parks (publisher)

Sources difficult to locate
Hi Doug, as you know I've been adding various details to the article. At times I'm unable to locate a book on google or at archive.org. For example the Mellan and Gooch works can't be located, by me at least. When they're listed at OpenLibrary or Amazon it's of no use to me. You once mentioned that you had a number of actual works in your library, and I was hoping you could list the ones found in our bibliography here. The biography of Parks, written by William Gooch, is of particular interest to me. Is this the same Gooch as Sir William Gooch, 1st Baronet? If so it would seem then that this (primary?) source would be the first biography of Parks ever written(?) -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:50, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the great improvements on the article. I see this article as a Good Article and it will get promoted quickly after the minor issues from the reviewer are done. Yup, the Mellen book IS NOT on-line. I used an actual hard copy of the book from the library. It so happens that the state I am from has an Inter-Library Loan system called Mel. All these examples are books I used in the past of this ILL system and are my pictures. The book you are talking about came from Central Michigan University which is 200 miles from where I live. I ordered it ILL and it arrived at my local library. I used it and gave it back to my library when done and then they sent it back to the University. I personally do not have any books on anything. I get all my hard copy books through my library and the Mel ILL system. Now it so happens that the state of Michigan is very big on education and all the Universities and colleges are full of reference books. I just order the book through the ILL system. It's like having access to the Library of Congress. Maybe your state of California has a similar ILL system. If all else fails ask your local library if they will order it from the Library of Congress. The LoC will loan the book IF your library will pay for the shipping of the book back and forth. It so happens that my library does that for me from time to time, when I can not get the book in Michigan. Sometimes my library just buys the book for me and keep it in their inventory. Or you could ask the Library of Congress to scan in the pages of interest from the book (or any book) and they will send it to you in a PDF. I do it all the time.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 19:02, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Worldcat shows "Gooch, William (1926). William Parks. William Parks Club" to be in several California libraries. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 20:29, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, I've ordered various books from the Calif. public library at times. I'll ask, but if they have to pay the shipping from and to the LoC for a given work they're likely to decline such a request. But who knows? It won't hurt to ask. Do you know if there's any connection to speak of between Parks and Gooch that it made him write a biography on Parks? I think we can assume this is the first biography of Parks(?) Gooch spent many years in Virginia and died one year after Parks did, so we know they lived in the same general place and time period. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:44, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, an ILL within California probably will work for you to get the book. Where are you located in California? I notice that the image you are using is a painting done at Rome for Nicholas Brown, so that means the painter's name is unknown. Now likely the painter died BEFORE 1890 because it had to have been painted before 1814 (death of John Carter). So 1890 minus 1814 is 76, so then the painter had to be over 24 years old at the time he did the painting for Nicholas Brown as 1890 makes the painter 100 years old (if 24). So 1890 plus the time of 70 years after the death of the painter is sometime sooner than 1960. That makes the painting public domain.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 21:32, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for catching that -- Yes Carter's Grandson, Nicholas, lived in a much different time period. I edited the DYK Template review talk to this effect. I'm still trying to nail down Parks' involvement with Gooch and his (apparent first) biography of Parks. Is this one of the books you ordered before? Would be interesting to know what prompted Gooch into writing it. I live in LA County (very big county area wise) in the high desert in the Palmdale-Lancaster area, about 90 miles north-east of L.A. The LA county library infrastructure consists of some 50 different libraries. They usually have whatever one is ordering, but Gooch's work seems like a long shot. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 00:41, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Don't know what prompted Gooch into writing Park's biography. Yes, I do believe this is one of the dozens of ILL books I ordered this year in Michigan. However I believe it came under the author Lawrence C. Wroth, as I see the date of publication is 1926. It seems to be some sort of reprint. Also here it is online at HathiTrust. I have been in the reconstructed Park's print shop a dozen times of the picture shown in the article that is located in Colonial Williamsburg on Duke of Gloucester Street. We have visited Colonial Williamsburg several times over the years. Here is a set of 1000 pictures we took of our 2006 trip to Colonial Williamsburg. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 10:29, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * — Okay, I'm impressed, very. Nice research, great pictures! Who's that fella sitting next to you on the bench? :-) I'm making use of Wroth's other 1926 work, William Parks, printer and journalist of England and colonial Williamsburg, per Hathitrust.  I added it to the Bibliography. Since there is now two 1926 works by Wroth, we simply distinguish between the two by designating 1926a and 1926b in the respective templates and sfn citations. I also located an interesting account about Goosh at Encyclopedia Virginia. Goosh had commissioned Parks to print some propaganda concerning a 1730 act regulating tobacco production and trade, and had the account printed anonymously. Will be adding this to the narrative soon. I'm gong to dig a little deeper first. A great pleasure working with you. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 16:45, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I believe that person sitting next to me is Thomas Jefferson. I came across him in 2004 when we visited Colonial Williamsburg. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 18:23, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Death date
While looking into Parks' final days and death I noticed that the lede, since before I began editing this article, indicates April 1, 1750 as the date of death, while the Later life and death section has March 23 for this date, cited by Thomas, 1874, and Krope, 1983. Where are we getting April 1st from in the lede? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:42, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Thomas (1874) page 334(top left of book) says, On the 23d of March, 1750, he embarked in one of the trading ships for England. Soon after the vessel sailed, he was seized with pleurisy, which terminated his life on the first of April of that year. His remains were carried to England, and interred at Gosport. I provided the page link in the Bibliography source for Thomas.--Doug Coldwell (talk) 10:14, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

Images of works

 * A better image of Stith's/Park's book exists at archive.org, which I captured and uploaded, shown at right. I was going to replace/overwrite the existing image but it's protected. I'd recommend replacing it, as the color of the newer version is realistic and the letters are not blurred. Also, as you probably know, many books have been re-digitized since 2013 and are now available in searchable pdf files. If you haven't done so already, you can download the searchable version here. I'm going to look into what's available regarding the other images in the Works section for possible inclusion here. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:51, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * ✅ uploaded the color version of Stith's 1747 cover page. Thanks for the improved images. --Doug Coldwell (talk) 19:38, 6 November 2021 (UTC)

Copyright contributor investigation and Good article reassessment
This article is part of Contributor copyright investigations/20210315 and the Good article (GA) drive to reassess and potentially delist over 200 GAs that might contain copyright and other problems. An AN discussion closed with consensus to delist this group of articles en masse, unless a reviewer opens an independent review and can vouch for/verify content of all sources. Please review Good article reassessment/February 2023 for further information about the GA status of this article, the timeline and process for delisting, and suggestions for improvements. Questions or comments can be made at the project talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:37, 9 February 2023 (UTC)