User talk:Lotwhiscot

I read with great interest your edit to Harlan County, Nebraska. Unfortunately, the information you gave didn't agree with the source cited, so I deleted it. I copied it into the article's talk page, so it's not lost. It looks as if you've got more information on Thomas Harlan than there is at the NACO website; if so, could you replace some of what I cut out with material from that? I get the impression that you had some information from the Nebraska State Historical Society and from a book on the Harlan family's history, but you'll need to be more specific about the source, so that readers can check it online or look for the book themselves.

--Ammodramus (talk) 22:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia, and thank you for your contributions. One of the core policies of Wikipedia is that articles should always be written from a neutral point of view. Please remember to observe this important core policy. Nyttend (talk) 22:09, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your note! It's not simply personal points of view that we must avoid: rather, when sources disagree with each other, we must be careful to represent all points of view.  Consider the introduction to Allen County, Ohio: although we have an official declaration from the Ohio legislature that it was named for one person, we mention the fact that many sources incorrectly assert otherwise.  Moreover, the Nebraska Association of County Officials (which created the text that appears on the National Association of Counties webpage) can generally be taken to be authoritative on the subject of Nebraska counties.  Do you believe that they're wrong in saying that some people assert it to have been James Harlan?  We have to be careful not to make authoritative pronouncements unless all sources agree with each other.  Nyttend (talk) 22:26, 29 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your note re. Harlan County, Nebraska. As a matter of fact, you caught me in the middle of trying to write a version that reconciles your and Nyttend's versions.  I'm trying to write a paragraph on the early settlement of the county, which would include Thos. Harlan's role in leading the party from Cheyenne.  I think that would be a good place for some of your information on him.  I'd then end the paragraph with something about sources disagreeing on whether he's the namesake.


 * I think Nyttend's point is not that we should trust NACO over your sources, but that we should acknowledge that sources disagree.


 * Just as a point of style: I think that when you're putting a note on someone's talk page, the usual practice is to put it at the bottom; and if you're starting a new topic of discussion, create a heading for it. Then if the discussion continues, it can be kept within that heading; otherwise, someone who's got ten or twelve discussions going at once is going to have a difficult time keeping track of which comment goes with which discussion.  (Of course, I've been an editor for nearly four months, so I really have no business pulling this old-hand act with you.)


 * --Ammodramus (talk) 23:23, 29 January 2010 (UTC)


 * OK, it's done. I found a couple of new sources and put them in.  You might want to look at the Fitzpatrick source-- it gives a much older source for the claim that the county was named after James Harlan.  I've used that instead of NACO, which I assume derives either from that or from the older source mentioned by Fitzpatrick.


 * I found the Jean McKee Rogers history online, and I've included that in the article as an external link at the end. I didn't use it for the early settlement history, because it's clearly taken directly from Andreas's History; the phrasing in many places is identical.


 * --Ammodramus (talk) 00:20, 30 January 2010 (UTC)