User talk:Hassocks5489/Archives/2011/May

Sompting Church
Hassocks5489, Thank you for rearranging the photos I inserted on Sompting Church page. It looks much better! Incidentally I have uploaded the image below to Wikimedia Commons. Is this the "abbott" referred to in the text of the article? (See Nairn & Pevsner p 331). If so do you think it is worth inserting?

Kinnerton (talk) 18:08, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Gustav Elfving
Hi Hassocks!

Thanks again for your suggestions, which improved the article. The muse belatedly whispered in my ear, and now a second hook does describe the surveyors' measuring device, the theodolite, pictured. Thanks again for your suggestion.

I assume that the DYK administrator shall choose the second hook but if you would add an okay and second the second hook then all would be well.

Best regards,  Kiefer .Wolfowitz 11:37, 2 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks again! BTW, the Project Euclid article by Nordstrom is open access, if you'd like to check the details. (JSTOR, however, requires a subscription.) Kiefer .Wolfowitz 12:45, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Gustav Elfving

 * ... that, after his fiancée died, Gustav Elfving joined a surveying expedition to Greenland, where he developed the optimal design of experiments while trapped in his tent for three days by storms?


 * Reviewed: Engine Company 2 Fire Station

Created by Kjs50 (talk), Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk). Nominated by Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk) at 13:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Pictogram voting keep.svg Good work on this bio. Date, creation details and length are fine; partly verified by online abstract, and otherwise on good faith.  Two points: the pic, which is of a generic theodolite, is difficult to create a (pictured) caption for within the hook; and there is an incomplete sentence in the "Other statistical contributions" paragraph.   Hassocks  5489 (tickets please!)  14:36, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for catching the incomplete sentence, which I fixed. I agree that the theodolite is hard to caption for this hook, although the roll-over text is accurate. May the muse inspire a WP editor to find a better hook. Thanks again! :-) Kiefer .Wolfowitz 19:36, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
 * HOOK2 Kiefer .Wolfowitz 11:33, 2 May 2011 (UTC)


 * ... that Gustav Elfving invented the optimal design of experiments, and so minimized surveyors' need for theodolite measurements (pictured), while trapped by storms in his tent in Greenland?

Request for Assistance (2nd May 2011)
I wasn't really sure how else to get a message to you. I see you are particularly active in representing local churches on Wikipedia, and wondered whether you could develop my church pages. I have done the very basics for St Margaret's Church, Halstead and St Katharine's Church, Knockholt in Kent, but don't really know enough about Wikipedia to expand them any further. I do hope you are able to help. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jackarias (talk • contribs) (Responded at Jackarias' talk page).

St John the Evangelist's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea, etc.
Hi. My grandmother lived in St Leonards, and when I was a child I visited her from time to time in the early 1950s. On one of the visits, we went to see an Important Person arriving for some sort of ceremony that took place at St Johns - either the start of the rebuilding or the reopening or I dunno what. Anyway, whatever it was was opened/rededicated/whatever by Princess Elizabeth, so it must have been not all that long before she became HM the Q. I haven't got a reference for this, but you might be able to locate one and add it to the article.

Changing the subject slightly, I see that you've done the Chichester church of the same name - good stuff! I was planning to start the article some time ago but got sidetracked by Henry Conybeare and all the architects called John Johnson and sundry other things. I notice that you cite "Nairn and Pevsner", but I'm pretty certain that the description of the church there is entirely by Ian Nairn, whose style differs more than somewhat from Pevsner's, to put it mildly (and see the Sussex intro for who wrote what). Best. --GuillaumeTell 16:57, 5 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the reply. 18 May, 1951, eh!  That was 8 days before my 5th birthday.  I'm not sure whether I actually saw Princess E, but there definitely was a big black shiny car and a large crowd.  Anyway, John Johnson #3 is at the bottom of my list of three (and there are also at least a further two minor John Johnsons, one a builder in Pimlico and the other based at Bury St Edmunds).  I first created John Johnson (architect) of Leicester - needs a bit more work - and am well on the way to an article on #2 (1807-1878), architect of the Ally Pally and sundry churches.  Your man can be found  here.  Pevsner is often rather sniffy about his stuff, but just look at that picture of Leyton Town Hall! (And click your way round the links and pictures). Anyway, it's my bedtime... --GuillaumeTell 00:09, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

John Howell & Son
I'm very glad that you've been able to take an interest in and use the article I started about the above builder. There are still many gaps:
 * If you are still interested in Hastings churches, you may like to keep an eye open in case you come across the designer of the Memorial Chapel, west side of Station Road (before 1884).
 * I strongly suspect that old man Howell himself was the designer-engineer for the original town sewage works. He seems to have done most other jobs for architects, but I've got a feeling that he may have been wholly responsible for this job.  If so, he was quite a hero, and worth crediting.  Presumably the record for that would be in the local archives among the council documents.
 * Now here's a big mystery for me. I originally researched this Hastings company because in Canterbury Cathedral archives the planning documents say that a firm with an identical name designed the extension, greenhouse and air-raid shelter of Mayfair Court, Herne Bay in the 1930s for Lydia Cecilia Hill. Unfortunately the original 1934 planning permission documents were destroyed in a 1940s air raid. But as you'll see from the Howell article, that firm appears to have died out in 1903. So now I'm working on two possibilities:
 * (a) Some descendant of the above firm resurrected the company name (unlikely?)
 * (b) The architect of Mayfair Court was the American John Mead Howells. He was a very prestigious architect to be dragged across the Atlantic for a little job - but the owner's sugar daddy was the Sultan of Johor, at that time one of the richest men in the world, and very influential.

I've been struggling to get this article together from about 300 miles away - so please forgive my eagerness when I spot someone else with a possible interest in the same area. I'm not asking for you to do any research; just thought you might be interested. --Storye book (talk) 15:45, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St John the Evangelist's Church, Chichester
The DYK project (nominate) 12:02, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Billingshurst Unitarian Chapel
The DYK project (nominate) 12:03, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Congrats!
Well done on your DYK for Billingshurst Unitarian Chapel! I got one for Newington Green Unitarian Church a little while ago. I'll add a bit to BUC, and add it to General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches. (I like to make the links within WP.) There are quite a few dissenting chapels in that list, and not on that list, that are historically significant and interesting in their way, if you are into that sort of thing. BrainyBabe (talk) 14:27, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Email
Hassocks, I've dropped you an email. Would appreciate some of your knowledge. - hahnch e n 13:37, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

List of churches preserved by the Churches Conservation Trust in South East England
All the links are now blue in this list, except for St Wilfrid's at Church Norton. Would you like to write an article on this church, or would you prefer me to write something short for now, so that you can improve it at your convenience? --Peter I. Vardy (talk) 13:47, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks; no rush. It will take me a few weeks (with Wikibreaks) to get the list up to FLC standard.  Cheers. --Peter I. Vardy (talk) 16:54, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I understand now from the messages below your pre-occupation with St Leonards-on-Sea! Congrats on an excellent series of articles (puts me to shame). --Peter I. Vardy (talk) 10:03, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Christ Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:03, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St John the Evangelist's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St Peter's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St Leonard's Baptist Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Church of St Thomas of Canterbury and English Martyrs, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St Mary Magdalene's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
The DYK project (nominate) 06:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Kent Churches (14th May 2011)
Have you had any time to look at expanding the St Margaret's Church, Halstead and St Katharine's Church, Knockholt articles yet? Looking at some of your other church contributions I'm very excited that you might be able to help our churches in the same way! Jackarias (talk) 14:30, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for St Wilfrid's Chapel, Church Norton
Materialscientist (talk) 16:47, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Hastings, John Howell etc
Hi – thanks for your note from last week here (sorry for the late reply!). Although I don't have it to hand, I suspect the book by David Thornton to which I made reference in some of the church articles (Hastings: a Living History, 1987) may be useful for some of the historical bits – I'm sure he wrote about the development of all the "services" stuff such as the sewers. The Memorial Chapel seems to have been a General Baptist chapel built in the 1860s/1870s and closed soon after (but after 1884); I can see it on a couple of the old maps on http://www.old-maps.co.uk/. The street layout has now changed completely and I know the building isn't there now. I remember reading a passing reference to it in one of my sources when I was doing the research for List of places of worship in Hastings a year ago, but haven't been able to trace an architect or builder yet.

I haven't found a lot in any other Hastings-related books I have to hand. Hastings library is mediocre, but there is a large local studies section in Eastbourne library, which is nearer me; I will need to go there at some point in the future to do some research for Eastbourne churches. I'll keep an eye out for anything Hastings-related when I go there. It's quite an interesting topic; good luck with your continued work on it! Hassocks 5489 (tickets please!)  12:51, 17 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Wow - thank you very much for kindly taking an interest in this subject; your information is extremely helpful. I think the article would certainly benefit from any further information that you might find, so I look forward to seeing any results that may happen. And please excuse my late reply too - I've been away from the computer.  I was originally given the location of the Memorial Chapel, on the phone, by a lady on Hastings Council staff.  She was sure that the building still existed on what is now the west side of Station Road.  Sadly I'm too many hundreds of miles away to be able to go and check, and Google streetview does not oblige.


 * I've just been to Wiltshire to photograph the sites of 1920s/30s postcard photos by Fred C. Palmer. You'd love the rich variety of parish churches there - a lot of money and a lot of wonderfully eccentric architects involved, I suspect. Uffington church has an octagonal tower, and the one at Longcot once had large urns set upon each corner.  The urns have been removed for safety reasons, sadly.--Storye book (talk) 16:28, 20 May 2011 (UTC)