Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of unique U.S. county names


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Randykitty (talk) 16:27, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

List of unique U.S. county names

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Wikipedia is not a directory. this information is trivia, as there is no particular interest in whether a county name is unique. Mercurywoodrose (talk) 03:20, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete It's cool that my county is on the list, but really this falls into the category of WP:Original Research as a manipulation of data, in this case county names, not an encyclopedia article or list about the real world itself. Borock (talk) 14:43, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * A clue is that I've lived in a uniquely named county all my life and never was aware of it. :-) Borock (talk) 14:44, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 15:14, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 15:14, 11 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete Clearly WP:OR. BenLinus1214 (talk) 18:05, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep The lists for List of the most common U.S. county names and List of less common U.S. county names (together include all counties which exist in two states or more). This list is meant to compliment the two others to give a full listing. Those two lists (most common and least common) created by other users are both derived from the Index of U.S. counties (as is this one). The information in the list of unique county names comes from the Index of U.S. counties with all the counties in more than one state removed (a list with some entries omitted). There are many lists on the topic which have been done in the same way some of which include true original research (a list of counties named after animals, plants, rivers and that share names with U.S. states. There is the list named after U.S. Presidents and women. There are also lists with the the most populous and and least populous which are also derrived from lists with information omitted. If we delete this list then I recommend we delete all of those lists as well and merge all this information into the index of counties and use extensive footnotes at the end of each county name. Or alternatively we could merge the information in this list into the list of least common county names under a separate subsection. I don't see the big deal in having this list. --Shabidoo | Talk 21:22, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * But still all of these articles are about the NAMES of the counties, not about the counties themselves. Have secondary sources talked about the names of counties as a notable topic, not just many sources each talking about the name of one county?Borock (talk) 15:02, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
 * The List_of_U.S._counties_named_after_plants has no references at all (much like most of these lists). So I'm not quite sure what you are talking about. There is no meaningful difference between listing counties that someone proposes is named after flowers and counties which exist in only one state (and more than one state or a lot of states)...they are both...according to what all of you say, trivial information. At least the latter is accurate and a source can be given. Based on the criteria you've all given the far majority of these articles should go. That's fine if you all agree. However this should be a request for deletion of multiple articles and we should decide which of all of these should go and how to merge all of this information into one or several articles. --Shabidoo | Talk 03:13, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I think the lists are cool and fun (to quote Ken from Toy Story 3) but don't belong in an encyclopedia. What happens (and don't take this personally) when someone nominates several comparable articles for deletion is that someone says: "He is starting a mass deletion campaign and trying to change WP policy." When just one is nominated it's: "Why nominate just one when there are others just the same?" :-)  -Borock (talk) 04:28, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Well I don't personally care if people complain that there is a mass-deletion campaign or not...if all these articles go against policy then they should all be deleted. Who cares if someone claims there is a mass-deletion campaign if deleting them adhere to policy and there is consensus on the question. If the arguments for deleting this particular article are sound and the apply to closely related (or even inter-related) articles in the same category on the same topic then we should nominate them all and come up with a solution on how to merge all this information. I'm more than happy to go either way depending on consensus on how users here interpret policy. --Shabidoo | Talk 21:07, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Let me think about if I want to nominate them. As for merging the information, I think each article on a county should give information on its name. I don't favor putting the bits together, in an encyclopedia that is. Borock (talk) 14:03, 15 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete I don't see OR as a concern here, but this is trivial, indiscriminate information. I would delete List of less common U.S. county names for the same reasons. Toohool (talk) 22:00, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I am confident that the data is correct and not made up by the author, but even so something can still be OR if a secondary source has not made the same connections before. Borock (talk) 14:58, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
 * This list is really a sequence of statements of the form "There is exactly one county in the US named X." I think these are permissible routine calculations, but the fact that there are few secondary sources speaks to a lack of notability for the topic as a whole. Toohool (talk) 03:48, 13 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment. Could this list (and perhaps List of less common U.S. county names as well) find a home somewhere in project or user space, as an aid to the curation and monitoring of county articles by WikiProject United States? --Arxiloxos (talk) 15:42, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
 * What would you propose?--Shabidoo | Talk 03:09, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't see how these lists would be helpful to people working on the county articles, but if you think so then do it. Borock (talk) 04:35, 13 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment Each article on each county should include the information on the meaning and the origin of that county's name. Borock (talk) 04:35, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment: I expected this to be a list of weird county names, which it totally is not!  Eagle County, Colorado?  Boring!  Deaf Smith County, Texas?  Yeah!  Anyhow, aside from whether it should be renamed List of U.S. county names used only once or something like that (which it should), our inquiry here is really whether the list is worthwhile to have.  I can see it being nice to be able to quickly determine whether a county name is used in more than one state.  Can we find any secondary source showing others agree it is interesting to know this information?--Milowent • hasspoken  00:37, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep. Because the most common, less common, and unique name lists could obviously easily be covered in one list-article.  It is fine that they are currently split into three;  that is a discretionary, editing decision about splitting or merging.  It would be fine by me if they were merged into one list-article, perhaps named List of U.S. county names by frequency.  A single list-article could still include all the interesting intro discussion about the top 60 that appears in the "most common" one.  Note that article/list-size considerations have changed a lot.  100k for an article is fine now;  the combo would be less than that.  Note the most common county names list was created back in 2004 (in this version by first editor Dralwik).


 * By the way, the material could be edited to be more encyclopedic, meeting some concern by some commenters above. If they were combined into one list-article, or even if not, it would be nice if there was more historical information given for all or some county names.  It is mentioned at the top of the unique names list that some names were previously used in counties that have been merged out of existence or that were renamed.  Why not include the specific info in notes in each county name row?


 * Note I believe this kind of material is encyclopedic, in a great, simple way, very accessible to younger readers and all readers. I like the fun lists of president-named ones, women-named ones, etc.  I am surprised that this discussion has not come to SNOWBALL KEEP, like similar Articles for deletion/List of flags by color combination did recently.  This is basic good stuff.  Sure, editing could improve the separate 3 list-articles or they could be combined into one list-article, but that is for editors to discuss at Talk pages, not for AFD. -- do  ncr  am  23:36, 18 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Weak delete The problem is that we are pushing a different snowball, the snowball of totally esoteric information. How about List of Bugs that are Green but not Red, how about List of U.S. cities without a Newspaper? WP is a great project, but c'mon, consensus is that we're 99% mature at this point.--Augustabreeze -19:24, 19 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment. There actually are sources specifically about the topic of U.S. county names.  See http://www.naco.org/Counties/learn/Pages/CountyNames.aspx, a National Association of Counties page/essay about names.  It cites a bigger study, maybe a book, by William Howard Taft, III: County Names: An Historical Perspective.  It mentions the topic of counties named for animals and lists many of them.  The page's main table is about the top 20 most frequently used names.  I bet there is coverage of the topic within many elementary school geography or U.S. history textbooks.  This is a valid topic, albeit simple / low-level, not terribly sophisticated stuff.  We commenting at this AFD probably have a lot more skill than average reader, average child, average American for whom English is not their first language, and this article is less to our personal taste, but the wikipedia is for everyone.  Also some above claim wp:OR, others (and me) don't see that.  It is not technically difficult to sort any list of U.S. counties and count the frequencies.  I voted Keep above already. -- do  ncr  am  00:31, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I think the best solution (for now) is to merge list of most common counties, least common counties and list of unique county names into one article (we can call it list of us state counties by frequency). That way if people search for this information (and it's not so easy to find it online...it takes a bit of searching) the search term will redirect to this page. The article can be broken down into three subsections. I think it's a good compromise considering doncram has found sources and this action would effectively eliminate three (perhaps redundant articles) by merging them into one. If that is the case I will create a new article on counties by frequency and then put a proposal to merge all the articles into that one and leave redirects.
 * In addition we might merge the lists on counties named after flowers, rivers, other states into one article but that's a different discussion. --Shabidoo | Talk 01:51, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
 * This is a strawman, nobody is arguing that county names or their etymologies are not notable. Nobody has suggested deleting List of the most common U.S. county names or List of U.S. county name etymologies (A–D) and its siblings. The information just doesn't need to be sliced and diced in every possible way for the sake of "completeness". The existence of List of U.S. counties named after animals doesn't imply a need for List of U.S. counties not named after animals, which I think would be an apt analogy for this article. Toohool (talk) 03:16, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
 * There is an article for 7+ counties, a 2-6 article and nothing for 1. Now we have all three and the lists are complete. That is not the same as, for example, taking a list of countries that begin with A and then complimenting it with a list of countries of B-Z. Counties which are unique and don't exist in other states expresses far more information than say, counties that aren't named after flowers (as trivial as it may seem to you). That's not the same at all.
 * No one has questioned the notability or citations for the article List of U.S. county name etymologies (A–D) (it covers all counties possible). What was questioned was the unreferenced article where the author speculates that the counties are named after flowers (for its notability as a standalone article, lack of references and OR which are the three arguments given for deleting list of unique county names).
 * If we merge the lists of counties and their frequencies into one article...and then merge the list of counties names which fit under certain categories (flowers, people etc.) into another article...at least then the lists won't seem so arbitrarily divided, trivial as a standalone article and will somewhat approach the quality of List of U.S. county name etymologies (A–D). --Shabidoo | Talk 05:40, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, slakr  \ talk / 04:46, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep - This seems to fit with the other lists of countys. I see all the lists fitting under WP:CSD #2. VMS Mosaic (talk) 04:59, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete. I'm not seeing any reliable sources discussing this unimportant aspect other than passing mentions here and there, nor any actually showing that the existing entries are in fact unique. Utterly trivial. Next up: List of U.S. counties whose names are two words long. Clarityfiend (talk) 08:21, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete - Definitely this list is a waste of our time. It serves no encyclopedic purpose. If you must then make a category, but I really don't see the need. Personally, as a non-American, I'd throw the whole lot in the trash bin. If I went around making a List of least common Australian municipality names, it'd be burnt immediately.  JT dale Talk ~ 09:31, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep - This is more or less a navigational device rather than a trivia page. I certainly wouldn't have put time into such a thing, but neither do I see a compelling reason for deletion. Carrite (talk) 20:03, 30 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete as original research, no source is cited to support the nontrivial assertion that these are in fact unique names. Also, WP:NOT an indiscriminate collection of information, as this set of data sorted or selected by a seemingly arbitrary criterium represents.  Sandstein   09:45, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.