Template:Did you know nominations/Harold Basil Christian


 * 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 Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:42, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Harold Basil Christian

 * ... that Southern Rhodesian horticulturalist Harold Basil Christian began cultivating aloes after his imported European plants struggled to grow in the hot African climate? Source: p. 38
 * ALT1:... that Harold Basil Christian, one of southern Africa's foremost horticulturalists in the early 20th-century, first planted aloe while trying to hide an unsightly rock? Source: "...when one large rock interfered with the continuity of the lawn and could not be removed a surveyor engaged in surveying the farm removed a clump of Aloe cameronii from a nearby hill and planted it close "to hide the stark appearance of this unsightly rock"."
 * Reviewed: Eugénie Henderson
 * Comment: Any suggestions for a better hook are welcome. Jgefd (talk) 04:39, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Created/expanded by Jgefd (talk). Self-nominated at 04:39, 2 December 2017 (UTC).
 * COMMENT: Lead of the article WAY too long. Reduce by at least half. And for that matter, the article is too long. Every known fact about HBC does not need to be in the article. As a hook, how about: David notMD (talk) 13:30, 22 December 2017 (UTC)


 * ALT2:... that Harold Basil Christian, a self-taught horticulturalist in southern Africa, became a world expert on African aloe species after planting one in his yard to block the view of a large, unsightly rock?

Getting there. Newness and length OK. Hook has citation. I shortened lead and article and proposed a better hook. Suggest you shorten lead and article a bit more. You have copied too much verbatim from the Rhodesiana reference. Deleting some of this content and paraphrasing the rest will solve this problem. David notMD (talk) 11:33, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi, thank you for making the lead more concise; it looks better now. However, what do you think needs to be shortened about the article as a whole? The article is not extraordinarily long. Also, I would never copy prose verbatim from a source purposefully but if you can recall any specific example of where it is too similar I am happy to change that. Jgefd (talk) 21:25, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I shortened the lead and article some. Other than the lead, I leave it to you to decide to put some of that back, leave as is, or try for even shorter. When I ran the Earwig's Copyvio Detector (in box in upper right corner) it suggested that there was a potential copyright violation with the Rhodesiana article and provided a side-by-side of your article with that article, highlighting exact wording in the two. What I am suggesting is a combination of modest deletions and paraphrasing. Looking forward to resolving this and approving the DYK. David notMD (talk) 21:36, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Again, thanks for the review. I shortened and paraphrased quite a bit. After running it through Earwig again, there were no more verbatim phrases besides a couple quotes and some longer proper nouns that could not be changed, like names or titles. I hope these changes bring the article up the DYK standards. Take a look and let me know what you think. Jgefd (talk) 23:22, 24 December 2017 (UTC)


 * Symbol confirmed.svg Good to go. New, long enough, passed copyright check, all three versions of hook have a citation, not a living person bio, nominator satisfied QPQ, and nominator addressed suggestions on improving the article. David notMD (talk) 11:44, 25 December 2017 (UTC)