Template:Did you know nominations/Astoria City Hall (old), Astoria City Hall (new)

Astoria City Hall (old), Astoria City Hall (new)

 * ... that Astoria, Oregon's Old City Hall (pictured), replaced in 1939 by a New City Hall, was later the home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?
 * Reviewed: Temple Emanu-El (Helena, Montana)
 * Comment: The first is an expansion (from a one-sentence stub), the second a newly created article.

Created/expanded by SJ Morg (talk). Self nom at 11:52, 27 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Symbol question.svg Both articles are fine, detailed and well sourced. I don't know if the naming of the articles is standard, and if New City Hall is the correct term. The hook: It took me a while to understand it, also I was confused when I looked at the brand-new Maritime Museum. Simpler:
 * ALT1: ... that after a former bank building became the New City Hall in Astoria, Oregon, the Old City Hall (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:59, 1 August 2012 (UTC)
 * The ALT hook is fine with me, an improvement. I had already been thinking that I should add "first" before "home" in the hook, to avoid confusion, but your rephrasing is even better.  By "naming" of the articles, do you mean how they are referred to in the hook or do you mean their titles at their own pages?  SJ Morg (talk) 19:57, 1 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I am not too familiar with naming conventions for such buildings, but I saw things like Old City Hall (Knoxville) and Altes Stadthaus, Berlin, in both cases the name of the building first, then the location. As you call them like that in the hook, perhaps think about moving the articles. Don't move the nomination ;) Let me know what you think, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:51, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

For anyone who's just joining us, bear in mind two different topics are being discussed here. First, regarding the titles of the articles (i.e. at their own pages): Actually, if you peruse Category:City and town halls in the United States you will find many examples of either title format, and placing the city name first appears to be much more common – but the point here is that either format seems widely accepted at Wikipedia. I'm not inclined to move either article, because the old city hall is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as simply "Astoria City Hall" (not even including "old", but the State of Oregon adds "(Old)" in its list of NRHP properties, to avoid confusion, and WP needs to do so for the same reason), and as far as I can determine the "new" city hall is hardly ever referred to as "new", because it has served as city hall since 1939 and now more than twice as long as its predecessor did. Maybe the article about the "new" (and current) city hall should be moved to just "Astoria City Hall", with the disambiguation page with that title then deleted and letting the hat notes suffice (I have no objection to that; any thoughts?).

Second, regarding the DYK hook wordings: Although I've had 24 DYKs before these two, almost none required any significant piping of the DYK-qualifying articles in the hooks, so it's not something I've had much reason to think about until now, and my inexperience on that point may be confusing things a bit. I can't imagine anyone would want a hook that uses both of these articles' titles verbatim – Astoria City Hall (old) and Astoria City Hall (new) – because of awkwardness and excessive repetition, with "Astoria" even appearing three times in the same hook. However, I can think of numerous alternative wordings and pipings even if the articles themselves keep their titles and even if the overall hook content remains the same as in ALT1. First, I should mention that, since "Old" and "New" are not part of the formal names (not even at the NRHP), I am now supposing I shouldn't have capitalized those words. And the same for "city hall" when the phrasing uses it as a description rather than as the name of a building. If you have any thoughts on this point, I welcome them.

And now, several more ALT hooks, all having the same overall content of your ALT1 but with variations in the piping, linking and capitalization:


 * ALT2:... that after a former bank building became the Astoria City Hall, in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?


 * ALT2a:... that after a former bank building became the new Astoria City Hall, in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?


 * ALT3:... that after a former bank building became the new Astoria City Hall, in Astoria, Oregon, its predecessor (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?


 * ALT4:... that after a former bank building became the new city hall in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?


 * ALT5:... that after a former bank building became the city hall in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) was the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?

In some or all of the above, I might have suggested "former city hall" instead of "old city hall" if not for the fact that "former" is in the preceding phrase.

At the risk of opening up another can of worms, I feel I should point out that the old city hall didn't become the Maritime Museum until 24 years after it ceased being city hall (something I hinted at by the inclusion of "later" in the original hook), but the Maritime Museum was the most interesting of the building's post-city hall uses and the only one with its own article at WP, and that's why I chose it for the hook. If anyone feels that these hooks' use of "after" strongly implies "immediately after" or "shortly after" (neither of which is correct here), then a longer (but still under the max. length) hook might be as follows (or omitting "repurposed as"):


 * ALT6:... that two decades after a former bank building became the city hall in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) was repurposed as the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?

Other variations that combine parts of these alts are also possible. SJ Morg (talk) 19:51, 2 August 2012 (UTC)


 * You are amazing! Let's see if I got it. Assuming that the "new" city hall (since 1939) is just called Astoria City Hall, I would probably move that article (Graham87 is my helper for such things), but better check with people who know better about naming building articles. Even without a move you could use it, play with:
 * ALT7:... that the old city hall (pictured) in Astoria, Oregon, became the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum, two decades after the Astoria City Hall was installed in a former bank building? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:29, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I don't know any editors who know a lot about naming of building articles, but I think I'll ask an administrator to move "Astoria City Hall (new)" to just "Astoria City Hall" (I cannot do it myself, because the latter – currently a dab page – has two edits in its history, which prevents anyone who is not an admin from moving another page over it; I'll leave a note here when and if the page is moved before this nom is closed/hook promoted).
 * Regarding the hooks: I feel that "Astoria City Hall" should be preceded by the word new – but now removed from the linked text – because the old city hall is listed on the NRHP under that exact same name.  Adding "new" to ALT7 doesn't come out right, so I would change the phrase order of ALT7 to the following, or use ALT9 –
 * ALT8:... that the old city hall (pictured) in Astoria, Oregon, became the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum, two decades after a former bank building was rebuilt as the new Astoria City Hall?


 * However, I think the following (which is similar to Alt2a, above, but with the "two decades" added, and "new" removed from the linked text) is even better:
 * ALT9:... that two decades after a former bank building became the new Astoria City Hall, in Astoria, Oregon, the old city hall (pictured) became the first home of the Columbia River Maritime Museum?
 * I am concerned that I am being too particular, and I do not want to spend too much time on this, or ask you to spend too much time on this, so I will be OK with ALTs 7, 8 or 9 (but my preference is for 9). Note that, even counting "(pictured)", ALT9 is still short enough (189 characters), and this is a double-new-article hook, so the 200-character limit need not be strictly applied, anyway. -- SJ Morg (talk) 09:20, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I will approve ALT9 once the move is done, thanks for your diligence, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:32, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Just now, I posted a message about this on the talk page of an admin I know. I will post an update here when there is news. Thanks. --SJ Morg (talk) 09:51, 4 August 2012 (UTC)


 * I've moved Astoria City Hall (new) and it's associated talk page to Astoria City Hall per request. Please check to ensure that all concerns have been addressed, and feel free to tweak or change my action as needed.  Best of luck with the DYK.  Cheers. — Ched :  ?  10:16, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Ched. Oh, and thanks for letting that other admin know that you've already taken care of this. -- SJ Morg (talk) 10:51, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * To avoid a possible mistake, or confusion, during promotion of this nom, I've now gone back and revised the piping of ALT9 to reflect the page move (but only of ALT9; the others are still outdated but presumably won't be used), something I imagine you (Gerda) had already planned to do. SJ Morg (talk) 10:55, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you both!
 * Symbol confirmed.svg ALT9, perhaps the mentioning of the city might be dropped now that Astoria is mentioned first, I leave that up to the one who promotes it, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:00, 4 August 2012 (UTC)
 * That thought had occurred to me, as well, but I have no preference. However, I do believe that the state, at least, should still be mentioned ("... Astoria City Hall, in Oregon, ..."), considering that there are several other places also named Astoria. But I, too, will accept the promoter's choice. SJ Morg (talk) 11:10, 4 August 2012 (UTC)