User talk:Towerhouse

Owen Maddock
Hello! Welcome to Wikipedia. I see you keep adjusting Owen Maddock's date of death to the 19th rather than 23rd. I was wondering on what basis you were doing that? Both of the references that I have for his death date give it as the 23rd, and one of those references is Doug Nye whom I would say has proven himself pretty sound on such matters. If you reply here I'll see it as I have placed this talk page on my Watch List. Bye for now.  Pyrop e  17:08, 8 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Hello to you aswell.


 * Owen Maddock was my father. I have been meaning for years to change the date of his death which was Wednesday 19th July 2000, I was with him when we lost him.  A sad day and much too soon.  I am sure there are many Cooper enthusiasts who still miss him and his wealth of technical knowledge of Cooper cars which he was still sharing with the Cooper Car Club at the time of his death.  Hopefully Doug will see this post too and not change the date back to the 23rd.


 * Sadly it is not so easy. Wikipedia runs as a repository and collation for published information, and isn't a forum for dissemination of new information. Its guiding principle is "verifiability, not truth". (See WP:V, for details.) While this may seem perverse and odd for an encyclopedia, it reflects the fact that it is essentially an amateur effort. Hence, for credibility's sake information ought to be traceable back to a respectable, reliable source. (See WP:RS.) While I have no doubt that you are Owen Maddock's son or daughter, the fact is that you could be anybody, and that you are arguing against a respected historian's obituary published in a major, national newspaper, and Allen Brown's highly-researched web archive, OldRacingCars.com, both of which quote the 23rd as the correct date. As these are the only two locations that I have ever found details of a date of death for your father I'm afraid that I have to go with those. It might help if you knew of any other source that had covered your father and his work, that could be used? Bye for now,  Pyrop e  21:02, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

I can understand that you need to verify information. Maybe if I contacted Doug Nye direct it would be easier for me to verify. I have Dad's death certificate which will back up this piece of information. You refer to Doug's obituary, my memory isn't clear as to the sequence of events following Dad's death but probably somebody like Roy Golding or Eddie Stait contacted him (Roy and possibly Eddie attended Dad's funeral). If I can provide any other evidence I am happy to share information with you but I can assure you I am Owen's only daughter and I'll bet he is chuckling in his grave right now!!


 * I would be only too happy to see further information about your father, if ever there was an engineer who deserved a biography then it seem like he should. If someone can come up with a whole book on John Tojeiro then I would have thought that The Beard could fill a couple. However, my life is pretty busy at present and the half hour or so I get each day to myself I use to scratch the historical itch here at Wikipedia. Perhaps some day I'll get a chance to turn a hobby into a profession! In the mean time, I have been doing some thinking and have asked around, and while I think a death certificate could just about be included as a reliable source under Wikipedia policy it may cause a bit of a fuss, especially as it would be hard for another person to verify post hoc. A thought occurred to me, which was then also suggested by another editor, that you could approach Allen Brown with a copy of the death certificate. That way he could amend his website, which in turn could be cited by your father's Wikipedia article (which I really should finish...). That way there is a reliable, transparent, readily-accessible, third party reference that can be used to contradict the widely circulated Daily Telegraph obituary by the esteemed Nye. I know this must all seem like a bit of a fuss over a fact that to you is incontrovertible, but unfortunately that's how Wikipedia works these days (we are trying to shake off the reputation for wildly inaccurate facts!). Allen is actually a registered editor here (User:Allenbrown) although he's not around much. Otherwise you could try contacting him or, probably better, Richard Jenkins directly through OldRacingCars.com. How does that sound? Thanks for your patience!  Pyrop e  15:56, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for this, I will try to contact Allen Brown. You say you could probably fill a couple of biographies about Dad, what an interesting concept. I have all his diaries, if only I could read his writing! I could never understand how he could produce these wonderful engineering drawings (without the aid of CAD) yet his diaries resemble Egyptian hieroglyphics!! Take care! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.134.55.191 (talk) 16:34, 10 January 2012 (UTC)