User:MReyes64/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Durant, Oklahoma - Death of John Lee

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I choose to investigate the Durant, Oklahoma article and the subject of the death of John Lee due to the lack of common knowledge of this in the local community. In the summer of 2020 I learned about the lynching of John Lee and the public burning of his body. It seemed that many Durant and Bryan county residents were unaware of this history and some in denial. This ignorance or denial of fact is something I hope to change. What one does with knowledge is choice, but ignorance denies that choice. The death of John Lee and the larger issues of Durant's sun down town status, large presence of the KKK in the past, and strong affiliations with the UDC and their placement of several monuments in and around Durant are underrepresented, often unknow to, or denied by Durant residents. In the future these subjects may need further investigation and possibly its own article to fully cover.

The section of John Lee's Death exists in the article of Durant Oklahoma, but has a long way to expand. The article lacks citations from a variety of sources to make it notable. The article also lacks a significant quantity of sources out side of one book. There are a variety of newspaper and book sources that exist and needed to be added. This section can also be improved by including more facts about that night, people involved, and the atmosphere leading to and following it. My overall impression is that I am pleased this section exists, but is in desperate need of a revision and expansion.

Evaluate the article
(Compose a detailed evaluation of the article here, considering each of the key aspects listed above. Consider the guiding questions, and check out the examples of what a useful Wikipedia article evaluation looks like.)

Lead section

The Death of John Lee does not have a good lead section. It does not have clear introductory sentence or begin with a concise, clear description. It does introduce the one source Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America and describing the photo included of John Lee's burning in Durant. It is only after this that details are given about the death.

Content

The content of this article is relevant to the the Death of John Lee as it relates to Durant. It covers, in bare bone terms, John Lee's suspected crime, the hunt for and killing of him, the public burning and desecration of his body, and tensions that existed afterwards. This article could also touch on tensions that existed prior to John Lee's death, including some clearing of Caddo's black district in preparation for the Corn Festival. This subject does deal with one of Wikipedia's equity gaps and is a topic related to historically underrepresented populations. Caddo's black neighborhood no longer exists and Durant in historical texted claimed to be an all white town. These voices no longer exist yet they did atone time and should be heard again.

Tone and Balance

Even though the scene described in the section of the Death of John Lee is dramatic and violent, it is handled in a factual neutral point of view. It does not attempt to persuade the reader, only to inform. It does leave out how some city histories tried to later down play the events and would argue if it rose to the level of being a "race war." The section does follow an encyclopedic tone.

Sources and References/ Organization and writing quality/ Images and Media

The sources and references for Durant Oklahoma - the Death of John Lee are abhorrent. There is only one and the full text of the section is a cut and paste of that source. The link is current and the book cited is an excellent source. The writing is clear and professional, but is in no way attributed to the original author James Allen. The original image is not included as part of the article.

Talk page discussion

This article's talk page Has one contributor on the section of John Lee's Death. I do disagree with the author that he does not feel that it is encyclopedic in tone, but his other points of limited sources, the subject notability, and the need for a full section rewrite are all on point. It also seems that the Durant Oklahoma talk page could use more contributors in general. The article is part of the Wiki projects Oklahoma C class, high importance and Cities C class.

Overall impressions

The Death of John Lee as part of Durant Oklahoma Wikipedia article is ready to be written. Knowing now that this section is only a cut and paste of the one citation on the subject makes it kind of laughable. I know that the facts from the book it was plagiarized from are correct and for that I am thankful, but it is time to write and cite this section for the first time.