Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Madison House (Kincardine, Ontario)


 * 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 keep. ansh 666 20:29, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

Madison House (Kincardine, Ontario)

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Poorly sourced article about a house, whose only potential claim of notability is that it's purported to be haunted. But the only references present here are a ghosthunter's Blogspot blog and a tourist directory, which are not reliable sources for the purposes of establishing a house's notability. Haunted or not, houses are not automatically entitled to have Wikipedia articles just because they exist, but this is not the kind of sourcing it takes to get them in the door. Bearcat (talk) 01:39, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions. Hhkohh (talk) 01:51, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Ontario-related deletion discussions. Hhkohh (talk) 01:51, 5 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Weak keep - I came to this thinking delete. The only other source I could find about "Madison" was, which is primary (some kind of B&B) and weak as a source. However, in searching the address (343 Durham Market Square), the house is registered as a historic place in Ontario - p. 8, , , . However, it probably should not stay at the current title. Chris857 (talk) 16:29, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Even a registered historic place still requires reliable source coverage, and isn't handed any automatic freebie on purely primary sources just for existing. Bearcat (talk) 17:45, 5 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep - It's a registered historical landmark per the Ontario Heritage Act. The government reports on it alone as supplied by Chris857 satisfy GNG. --Oakshade (talk) 02:33, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
 * No, they don't. GNG is media coverage, not government reports — if government reports conferred a GNG pass all by themselves, we would have to keep an article about every single building that exists on earth including residential houses. Bearcat (talk) 22:26, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It appears you have a fundamental misunderstanding of GNG and what types of sources are considered evidence of notability. GNG explicitly states sources of evidence of notablity include "but not limited to newspapers, books and e-books, magazines, television and radio documentaries, reports by government agencies, and academic journals," not simply the ambiguous term "media." --Oakshade (talk) 00:00, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * No, I understand GNG correctly. For example, construction companies always have to file construction plans with a city planning commission before they can build any building or structure at all, and then the city planning commission has to vote to approve or reject those plans, or demand further changes to comply with regulations — meaning that every single structure that exists can always be sourced to a government report, because no structure ever comes into existence without being documentable to city planning commission files. You can't even put a granny suite in your backyard without the city planning commission having a file on that — so every granny suite in existence is documentable to government reports too. But we can't simply extend notability to every building that exists — so a building's notability cannot rest on routine sources that every building could always show, and has to rest on a class of sourcing that doesn't routinely exist for every building: namely, being singled out for special dedicated attention by media. Bearcat (talk) 16:53, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * You're confusing routine building permits/applications and files that all buildings have with in-depth analysis and historical context reports' that are not just documents on file at city hall. Your granny suite in your backyard does not have a government in-depth report of the analysis of the historical significance of it as this topic does.   If you'd like to change GNG to not accept reports by government agencies as evidence of notability, you need to make you proposal and case on the GNG talk page, not push your new agenda on a single AfD. --Oakshade (talk) 17:28, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Architecture-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 03:05, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Geography-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 03:05, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Paranormal-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 03:08, 7 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete In order to pass WP:GEOFEAT: Buildings, including private residences and commercial developments may be notable as a result of their historic, social, economic, or architectural importance, but they require significant coverage by reliable, third-party sources to establish notability. I don't see the reliable third-party sourcing here yet. The government documents that grant historical significance appear primary - perhaps I'm wrong on this. If precedent exists that all historically notable houses pass GEOFEAT please ping me. SportingFlyer  talk  07:23, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Government reports on private entities such as this location are not primary. --Oakshade (talk) 16:16, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I disagree. Three of the four sources are from the city of Kincardine, which is the city that authorized its historical heritage, and are the documentation of the way it became a heritage site. The other is a walking tour of all the historic properties of Kincardine. Are you making the argument all of these heritage properties in this small Ontario town deserve their own wikipedia article based on WP:GNG? Because they should all have this level of sourcing. Even assuming the references are not primary, the sources are trivial - and the reason this house has an article in the first place is for a completely different reason, because it was listed on some haunted ghost tour blog or something. A historic property can be notable, and fairly easily so - but a property cannot pass WP:GNG if the only sources are the ones which reference the fact it's historical in the first place. SportingFlyer  talk  21:50, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * This is easy. "The city that authorized the historical heritage" is not the property.  The property is not the city, not owned by the city nor a city government entity. A property easily passes WP:GNG if the only sources are the ones which reference the fact it's historical, provided the coverage is in-depth as it is in this case.  And in-depth historical analysis is not "trivial".--Oakshade (talk) 22:43, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It's more difficult than you make it out to be per WP:PRIMARY. The local government ordinance is nowhere close to being an independent source. It's not as if the municipality is publishing information about this house specifically: this type of coverage would be expected for all heritage listed properties in the town. There's no other coverage of it anywhere. Not every historical building gets a notability pass for Wikipedia because it's historical, especially when the only documentation about its history is the type of documentation which exists for any historic building in any jurisdiction by the local government, which is what we have here. (along with a town "walking tour" which appears to list all historic properties in town.) SportingFlyer  talk  14:43, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * You seem to be blending the claim that the government sources of this property are "primary" with regular notability arguments. It makes no difference if the government makes reports on all historic properties or just one as the government is still not the property and therefore not primary.  Every National Register of Historic Places property would be considered "primary" under that scenario which of course they aren't. If you'd like to say "I don't think all properties the government considers historic are notable," fine.  But to claim government reports are "primary" to private properties is simply false. --Oakshade (talk) 16:31, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm simply interpreting WP:PRIMARY properly: Primary sources are original materials that are close to an event, and are often accounts written by people who are directly involved. — which is what the Kincadine local ordinance and property description is. SportingFlyer  talk  16:59, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Cherry picking a subsection of No original research to attempt to show a government source is a primary one to a private property really looks like grabbing at staws. That quote is meant to discourage original research, which of course this is not.  Just that the secondary source is geographically close to the topic doesn't magically transform it into a "primary" source. And I'm surprised I have to say this, this property is not an "event." Anyway, since you're valuing the content on the NOR page and classifying this topic as an "event," WP:SECONDARY states a secondary source "provides an author's own thinking based on primary sources, generally at least one step removed from an event."  The property is "at least one step removed" from the government reports and those reports are the very definition of WP:SECONDARY. --Oakshade (talk) 22:18, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I feel like you're grasping at straws to keep an article which should clearly be deleted, to be honest. Let's recap: Does this property get a notability waiver for being a Canadian National Heritage Site? Not from any available sources, no. Does it get a notability waiver for being an Ontario Heritage Site? No, as there are many of these sites. Perhaps this notable enough for a list. The only available sources shown for a keep are primary sources showing the property is an Ontario Heritage Site, which can be expected for all properties on the Ontario Heritage Site list (I'm excluding the one or two sentence blurb from the walking tour brochure.) No other sources are available... and again, the reason this article exists is to promote a "haunted house." They may not be primary sources since the owners of the house didn't write about the house and try to get it published. SportingFlyer  talk  06:42, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Now you've changed the subject as your "primary" argument holds no weight. Sorry, it was you who was grasping at straws with that attempted application of WP:NOR for your false argument that government reports on this private property were "primary." The in-depth coverage from the detail analysis of the government reports easily show this passing WP:GNG.  Your false "those are primary sources" argument didn't work. If you think this or any article "should clearly be deleted" then try to build a consensus for your opinion which doesn't seem to be happening. --Oakshade (talk) 19:13, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm tired of saying the same thing over and over again. The government sources aren't primary to the house, but they are primary to your concept of notability (that the house is notable because the government has made it a local heritage site), and if we accept them, we erode WP:GEOFEAT by allowing features included at the sub-national heritage level to be included in the encyclopedia. Give me a secondary source that's more than a couple sentences. SportingFlyer  talk  08:39, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Now you're not even reading correctly. The property is notable because of in-depth coverage from secondary sources, in this case government reports.  The government is secondary source even by your standards of applying the WP:NOR policy which you linked to above.  Now that you're finally admitting the government sources aren't primary to the house, let's move on. --Oakshade (talk) 15:12, 11 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment. If it was included on the Canadian Register of Historic Places then it would be notable per WP:GEOFEAT: "Artificial geographical features that are officially assigned the status of cultural heritage or national heritage, or of any other protected status on a national level and which verifiable information beyond simple statistics are available are presumed to be notable." However, this appears to merely be a local listing, which does not count. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:19, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep. Note this should be covered at List of historic places in Southwestern Ontario.
 * First, this should not be outright deleted, because merge to the list-article is available as an alternative to deletion. It does not yet seem to be included in that list-article;  it should be added.  I myself am not familiar enough with Canadian historic places to understand why it is not yet listed there;  User:Magicpiano is an editor who has developed that list-article and others like it and I would be glad if they could comment here.
 * I prefer "Keep" over "Merge" because the information available, i.e. this source given above, suggests to me it is equivalent to U.S. National Register of Historic Places eligibility ("Italianate architecture – low pitched mansard roof – centre tower on the front façade – windows with rounded headers and decorative keystones and a verandah with Greek columns – built in 1870’s by Thomas C. Rooklodge whose family operated the “pork factory” / Designation By-law – 4641 Date Designated: January 3, 1985 ). It would be nice to have a separate nomination document about it, and I presume such exists, [it does exist] although it is designated by the province of Ontario [by local government] and is apparently not a Canadian national historic site. --Doncram (talk) 17:01, 9 July 2018 (UTC) --17:35, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It's not equivalent to the national register of historic places: see Ontario Heritage Act. It shouldn't be on the list you mention. I would be a keep if more historic notability could be shown; this is just a property which a local municipality has declared a local heritage site, but there are many of these sites in this town alone. SportingFlyer  talk  17:09, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * (ec) I was going to say, in fact there is separate nomination document (linked above) sufficing to provide information to develop the article more, and IMO comparable to U.S. National Register documentation. Based on photo of the house, I would have called it Second Empire in style, with elements of Italianate as Second Empire buildings often have, but the summary above was just calling it Italianate. However the Walking tour brochure does term it Second Empire, so that can be used in the article.
 * I do think it should be included in the Bruce County historic places list article, which is supposed to cover sites designated "locally, provincially, territorially, nationally, or by more than one level of government." Given your assertion I am not sure if it is province-level or not (what does according to Ontario Heritage Act mean, I will go look that up, yes [okay i see the provincial act gives authority to local government] ) but it is at least locally-designated.  We do have list-articles about local registers in the U.S., and about individual places on just a local register if there is adequate information, as there is here. There's plenty about it, IMO.  This is fine to Keep and develop. --Doncram (talk) 17:15, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * To be clear, all of the locally designated historic places can/should be covered in the Bruce County list-article or a separately-broken out list-article about places in Kincardine alone. They don't have to get separate articles, necessarily, but they can get separate articles if there's enough info available, as there is here IMO. --Doncram (talk) 17:17, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * And about the "primary" quality of the sources, as Oakshade notes above, they are not primary to the property; calling them secondary is more appropriate.  SportingFlyer is right that as local sources they are not quite as good as sources that have undergone more levels of professional review, and none is guaranteed here.  U.S. NRHP listings do get some state-level review reflected in modifications to the application forms.  But state-level or local-level source forms are in fact used directly in many NRHP listings, with or without any further documents from higher state or national levels (although there may have been higher review in fact or at least potentially).  So we have to go partly on the apparent quality of the documents, which seem okay to me. --Doncram (talk) 17:35, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * To settle one question, I just began adding Kincardine locally-designated historic sites to the list-article. Note the list-article has a municipal listing identifier column which I am trying to use, but having some trouble (discuss at Talk:List of historic places in Southwestern Ontario).  There is no "Notes" or "Description" column, so it is not feasible to merge all available material, even to give a single descriptive word like "Italianate", into the list-article.  Unless the standardized format of this Ontario historic places list-article is to be changed, it seems we need to "Keep" the article to allow description. --Doncram (talk) 18:14, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * This conversation should occur on the talk page of that article. I disagree with what you've done, as that list is for registered historic places as searchable on - there is only one registered building in Kincardine, and it's not this property. This is why I'm fighting for a delete, where I am probably a lean keep on geographical AfDs: all we have to go on is a primary document for a provincial heritage registry, not something which would automatically be notable. SportingFlyer  talk  18:22, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Also, this document: says Kingston has over 1,000 places on the Ontario Heritage register, but only 120 on the national register. I can't find anything showing this is on the national register, and in the absence of documents on the property that don't relate to its local listing/aren't primary, I don't think it can be kept. SportingFlyer  talk  18:58, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay maybe the Kincardine ones should be in a separate new list-article, and maybe not in that Southwestern Ontario list-article, and that is being discussed there, including with more info about the Kingston example. However IMHO there certainly should/will be a list of Kincardine municipal historic sites somewhere.  So the existing Madison House article will not be an orphan;  it will be listed in context somewhere.  However we still have more reliable enough info about the architecture and history of this house than will be covered in such list-article, so keeping a separate article still makes sense.  Of course we should drop most or all of the rubbish about being haunted.
 * Maybe we should not get too bogged down in whether to call the available official coverage "primary" vs. "secondary". I suppose you can call it primary if it is written without including explicit sourcing to other documents, and I think these do not include lists of references.  However there are 70,000 Wikipedia articles about U.S. NRHP places which mostly are sourced just to documents relating to their listing, which you may call "primary".  Many of the NRHP documents do reference other sources;  many do not.  You can't be too harsh about "primary" sources;  they are allowed in Wikipedia as long as they're not being stretched to make disputable points.  I don't think it is controversial to say the Madison House has elements of Italianate style, etc., based on the local listing saying so, plus the photos which show those elements to the informed editors. --Doncram (talk) 20:35, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, we've decided that NRHP and Canadian national historic places can get notability waivers — in this instance, we're dealing with a property whose only sourcing is its addition to a local heritage list. Whether an article on the local heritage list for a 12,000 person town is notable is not for me to say at this point, and I don't mind if the information is captured somewhere, but there's nowhere near enough to keep this particular article at this moment. SportingFlyer  talk  06:45, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Ad Orientem (talk) 03:33, 13 July 2018 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: Given the very lengthy discussion above, including a *potential* ambiguity in GNG vs GEOFEAT being discussed, I'm going to relist this again

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Nosebagbear (talk) 10:45, 20 July 2018 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: Final re-list; should be closed as no consensus if no editors' comment subsequent to this...

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Lourdes  08:22, 28 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment What, is this still open. Source(s) were found to develop the article.  It is listed on a local historic register, and there is plenty of info to be reported.  The comment that there is "nowhere near enough to keep this particular article" is just wrong, IMHO.  I would say "obvious keep" at this point. --Doncram (talk) 06:01, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete the sourcing does not justify a stand alone article. Although that is true for the majority of articles we have on buildings.John Pack Lambert (talk) 23:45, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep per Chris857, Oakshade and doncram. Satisfies GNG. Registered under the Ontario Heritage Act. The sources are fine. The "registered by local government" argument leaves me completely unmoved. If it is a listed building, it is listed building. Deletion would violate ATD, PRESERVE and R, since this could be merged and redirected to the area in which it is located, Kincardine, Ontario. (For the avoidance of doubt, Durham Market Square or Street or whatever, Kincardine has coverage apart from this building (eg By-law 518), so an article on this Durham Market location is an option for compromise). James500 (talk) 07:02, 1 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep per WP:BEFORE. I dug deeper into the interwebs by removing the word "Ontario" and finding several potentially good sources, including books. If it's "listed" provincially, that should be in the article before this AfD is closed. Bearian (talk) 16:18, 2 August 2018 (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.