Template:Did you know nominations/Albert Heard


 * The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as |this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:16, 22 June 2014 (UTC)

Albert Heard

 * ... that American businessman Albert Heard was once the Russian consul in China?
 * Reviewed: Lang Jingshan

Created by Philg88 (talk). Self nominated at 09:42, 2 June 2014 (UTC).


 * Symbol question.svg Phil, I am sorry, but I have to start by questioning whether the article passes Notability (biographies). Can you post an explanation on article's talk about how this biography fits that requirement, and ping me? I'll consider then whether this should be AfDed or reviewed as a DYK (incidentally, it's currently too short at 184 words, making it a stub; DYK articles should be at least start class, roughly 250 words or more). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 10:50, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
 * No problem . It was my fault as I was a bit premature in submitting this. I have expanded the article and added a number of independent sources to establish notability. It is now 1850 B in length. Cheers, Philg88 ♦talk 13:55, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
 * The article is fine for DYK now (length, date, hook, neutrality). However, my concern over notability still stands: what makes him notable? The most important position he held was to be a consul, which falls under WP:POLITICIAN and Articles_for_deletion/Common_outcomes. Please let me know which parts of those guidelines this person satisfies (you may want to copy the argument to the article's talk as others may raise it in the future). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 02:12, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi . As I understand it, notability does not mean that an individual has to have been a specialist in any specific thing (in your example politician). Rather it requires significant coverage in multiple published secondary sources, which are reliable and independent of the subject. Heard satisfies those criteria because of what he did in 19th century China and regardless of his position as consul. Philg88 ♦talk 05:33, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Are any of those sources discussing him in detail? Are there any articles, books or book chapters about him? Because from what I see he is only mention in passing in those sources, and this I am afraid does not constitute "significant coverage". Am I wrong? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 06:07, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * . I don't think you're wrong but the Kwang-Ching Liu reference quotes extensively from Heard and is certainly not a passing mention. The notability policy for people allows for "multiple independent sources" and there are a significant number of these. This is particularly important given that we are talking about a businessman active in a remote area of the world 150 years ago, the fact that he is mentioned at all makes him stand out. I would also mention that Heard's book on the Russian Orthodox Church is referenced in just about every work on the subject published since. If you want to take it to AfD, that's your decision. Philg88 ♦talk 06:49, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * You make valid points about the bias in reference regarding this time and place. I am torn here. The article passes DYK criteria, but notability is a clincher. I think I'll defer this to the second reviewer - let them chose whether to pass it (if they think the subject is notable) or AfD it. So: Symbol question.svg for me. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  08:20, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Fair call, thank you. I really don't want this to start an AfD precedent. There are hundreds of businessmen of this era who have weaker referencing than this one but nevertheless are important in the overall history of commerce. Best, Philg88 ♦talk 08:27, 3 June 2014 (UTC)


 * I was invited by the nominator to take a look at this one. I think an American who served as the Russian consul in China and as the Chinese representative in Russia, and published an influential book about the Russian Orthodox Church, is inherently notable. Piotrus expressed the valid concern that quoted sources do not discuss him in great detail, but as someone who has written many articles on Chinese history, I can vouch that numerous famous people in China (kings, generals, movie stars, etc.) only get passing mentions in English sources. After searching Chinese sources (which is difficult as there are numerous ways to transcribe any English name in Chinese characters, and he may have had a Chinese name that's unrelated to his English name, as many foreigners in China do), I found this book on the history of HSBC that says Albert Heard, as the chief executive of the second-largest American firm in China, was the second-ranked member on the founding committee of the HSBC Bank. Any of these roles individually could be sufficient to establish notability, and considering all of them as a whole, I believe he clearly meets the notability requirement. -Zanhe (talk) 06:58, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Since I already spent quite a bit of time reading the article and researching the sources, I may as well finish the review. The article is new enough, long enough, neutral, and well referenced. The hook is verified with inline reference. No close paraphrasing detected by Dup Detector. QPQ done. Good to go. Symbol confirmed.svg -Zanhe (talk) 20:43, 9 June 2014 (UTC)