Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michigan Corners, New York


 * 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 straight-out keep. Redirect proposals follow normal editoral method, as noted at WP:REDIRECT.  Daniel Bryant  08:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Michigan Corners, New York

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

I pass through this intersection enough and it's just not notable. The deli may have the name, but it's not the local ZIP Code or fire district and there's just a pizzeria and an Italian restaurant, plus the only traffic light between Montgomery and Middletown on 211. I think anyone who lives in the vicinity would say they live in Scotchtown, if anywhere. At the most it can be merged back into Wallkill, Orange County, New York Daniel Case 04:01, 4 May 2007 (UTC) As per below I withdraw the nomination and will convert the article into a redirect. Daniel Case 00:43, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment the only "per below" you can be referring to is your own remarks, not those of editors who have looked into the article in question. "Per below" the community may be verging on inconsequential today, but WP:PAPER pretty clearly comes into play in such an argument.  Historically the community was apparently far more consequential than it is today.  There are ghost towns littering the landscape of America, and while not all of them are necessarily worthy of independent articles, none of them should be subsumed in articles about political entities that developed long after they disappeared... in this case, however, the community, miniscule as it is, is still there.  If it's subsumed into an article it should not be into either Wallkill, Orange County, New York or Scotchtown, New York, but into (and only into) Unincorporated communities in Orange County, New York.  Tom e rtalk  09:00, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I've not only looked into the article; I happened to pass through there again yesterday. I haven't changed my mind. This place has no fire district, no school, no ZIP Code and no phone exchange. No one in the area uses the name; I doubt many would even know which intersection you're talking about. I'm open to putting it into "unincorporated communities"; however, that usage suggests it is a place people live in and identify as their home. There is a huge difference between Michigan Corners and Pine Bush ... you'd never guess that has never been incorporated as it's almost as big, if not bigger, than some of our incorporated villages. Plus, it has its own ZIP Code, phone exchange, school district and fire district. The article is unlikely to ever hold enough notable information to be more than a stub, in any event (and maybe less, given that I'd like to see a reliable source for that story) Daniel Case 17:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You might also be interested to know that the Michigan Corners Deli is actually now known as Scotchtown Deli & Catering. I can provide a picture if you like. Daniel Case 18:09, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Historically the community was apparently far more consequential than it is today. Based on what source do you make that claim? We delete that sort of phrasing from articles, you know, or at least tag it properly. Daniel Case 18:01, 6 May 2007 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Daniel Case (talk • contribs) 18:01, 6 May 2007 (UTC).
 * Your arguments center around your own personal experience. WP:NOT.  My assertion that "historically the community was apparently far more consequential than it is today" I have to source to one User:Daniel Case, who asserts that the place is not notable.  I didn't add it to the article, so it doesn't require a fact tag.  Thanks anyways tho, for offering to do a run-by tagging of your own statement.  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * If you had any better arguments than belittling mine, you'd be using them. No, my personal experience and knowledge of the history of the area I've lived in for the last decade or so aren't controlling, and not the exclusive criterion for keep or delete, but neither should they be totally dismissed. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Belittling? Hello pot, meet kettle.  You said my assertion would require citation, I cited you, since you were the source of my statement!  If that's belittling you, it's not me doing the belittling.  In case you haven't figured it out, I'm not really that attached to keeping the article itself.  You're in a better position to know than I am...if the community, such as it is, is within Scotchtown, then it's appropriate to include it in Scotchtown.  If it's not, then it's inappropriate to do so.  My understanding is that it is not.  Just because that's where the closest PO is doesn't make it the most appropriate place to cover Michigan Corners.  I still think it should be in Unincorporated communities in Orange County, New York.  I'll address the redlink thing down lower where you bring it up...  Tom e rtalk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

*Delete if you want. I only included because it's mentioned on the Middletown page, and there's a cute story behind the name. (Of course, Danny seems to have it in for me, but never mind...) RMc 12:54, 4 May 2007 (UTC) Observation: Why did it fall to me to Google and find that Scotchtown Highlander snippet? I would think that people arguing for inclusion would have found it long ago, instead of just looking for websites that merely mentioned the name. Speaking of which, the other Google hits do not argue well for notability: the Middletown and Scotchtown pages and their mirrors, sites with lists of place names, a NYSDEC permit application that is now a dead link, automated pages at search sites generated from GIS searches on the coordinates ... you get the point. Nothing that really argues for broader notability. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete The locals don't even think its notable as they have no sign marking it. 'nuff said.  Jody B   talk 11:50, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Signs marking places are usually made by the municipal, town, county or state highway departments, not by "the locals". Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * And while the New York State Department of Transportation marks any number of small intersections around the state as "X Corners", it chose not to mark this one so. Why, I wonder? Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * When I get a job working for the NYDoT, I'll be sure to check into that, right after orientation. Tom e rtalk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. Curiouser and curiouser...  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * See below for explanation. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete, cute story, but NY is full of cute stories. Clerks. 17:24, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Weak Delete. The US Board of Geographic Names calls it a "populated place" but I can't dredge up any information about it.  Perhaps someone with better knowledge of the area could merge any pertinent information to a parent article ...  Ark yan  &#149; (talk) 18:34, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. Hamlets and other settlements are automatically notable, even if they are tiny. Google Maps shows it at http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=41.466944,-74.347778&spn=0.3,0.3&q=41.466944,-74.347778 See also http://geonames.usgs.gov/pls/gnispublic/f?p=151:3:17345019660109350776::NO::P3_FID:957068 Remember that "notable" is not a synonym for "exciting". I added appropriate categories and coordinates, so the article is now an acceptable stub. --Eastmain 18:50, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Eastmain. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 20:22, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Eastmain. Towns, villages, etc. are inherently notable regardless of size. --Oakshade 22:00, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This is not a town or a village, or a municipality in any sense. It is not even a particularly large place ... just an intersection with some stores. It is not in local use. Daniel Case 00:45, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Incorporation is not part of inherent notability. A place doesn't automatically become notable because it incorporates.  If it does, I'm gonna legally become a place and incorporate.  Then I'll warrant a WP article of my own! :-D  Oh, and I added an appropriate fact to your uncited assertion above.  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Putting fact tags on other people's arguments is not something I've ever seen people do in deletion discussions, and I've been in many. I consider it rather declassé and churlish. In the old days simply requesting the other person put up or shut up was enough. But fine. You want proof it's not in local use? Googling on the website of our local daily newspaper, the Times-Herald Record, produces nothing, no stories that ever used it (I prefer google because their own search engine is a bit difficult to use, but the results there got a lot of obits of people who died in Michigan.). And this local history site says, and I quote, "The name survives on maps of the area to this day although it is rarely used by locals in conversation." While that last source does provide us with a reliable one (I think) for the origin of the name, and could certainly be condensed to a short graf in the Scotchtown or Town of Wallkill articles, it does not justify a separate article on the place. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Meh. It was fun to slap a fact tag in there.  Let's concentrate on the fact, however, that your statement demanded citation, instead of on spluttering about your views of my placement of fact tags.  Your citation demonstrates that the placename, while "rarely used by locals in conversation" is apparently still used.  I'm beginning to wonder perhaps if we aren't talking past each other simply because you're mad because I'm so obstinately opposing your AfD nom.  I propose that we take most of the future of this discussion to one of our talkpages, or perhaps to Talk:Michigan Corners, New York, probably more preferably even to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New York, just so the increasingly inane exchange here ends.  Tom e rtalk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm obstinate because, usually, when I make an AfD nom I mean it. We're supposed to be bold, aren't we? I don't believe we should use the talk page of an article that I think ought to be turned into a redirect ... I hate keeping talk pages around for articles that have been merged into others. "Rarely used by locals in conversation" but still used by cartographers says to me: redirect. Daniel Case 06:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Eastmain. WP is a collection of cute stories.  :-)  Tom e rtalk  22:28, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * In other words, WP:ILIKEIT. Not a reason to keep. Daniel Case 00:43, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Please do not attempt to paraphrase or cast aspersions upon my comments when you clearly don't know what you're talking about. My remark was a jocular comment based on User:Clerks' !votenote, which you clearly did not read.  Tom e rtalk  02:32, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Apologies. You should have made your humor clearer. I would not use jocular arguments to support a serious vote. Daniel Case 17:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * It was a !vote, not a vote. You don't use jocular arguments to support a serious vote.  I occasionally make jocular remarks when !voting on AfDs.  I guess it's true what they say&mdash;no two people really are alike.  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per the commentary above. Burntsauce 23:35, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Withdraw nomination and redirect to Scotchtown, New York. Nobody, and I mean nobody, locally uses this name save the deli. There are a lot of toponyms all over USGS maps that are no longer in local use. Notable isn't necessary exciting, but used on the map isn't necessarily notable either. If we ran articles on all of them, we'd be full of geocruft. Daniel Case 00:43, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You can't open an AfD and then, just because you don't like how it's going, withdraw the nomination and opt to unilaterally obliterate the article in favor of a redirect to an article that barely mentions the subject of the article you objected to from the outset. Tom e rtalk  08:54, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That's for a closing admin to decide, and usually they abide by the nominator's wishes (if someone else thinks it should have been deleted, they are perfectly free to renominate — that happened to me once.). In any event, all that Wikipedia needs to have about this is in this article and it can be merged into Scotchtown, which is where everyone there tells you they live in. Daniel Case 17:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * And I, of course, am an unfair admin, since I think you've acted improperly. What everyone there tells you when you ask them where they live is OR.  If you put it into an article, it will require a fact...  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * See above re sourcing. In every previous instance where I have withdrawn a nom (not many) it has been closed almost immediately. I did this because of that wonderful quality called further reflection. It told me that I was perhaps a bit hasty in nominating this for deletion. I was a bit taken aback that the creator, User:RMc above, had exploded into a rage of personal attacks, a situation I've already reported since he has been blocked for similar behavior before, and put it on me to create the article about the undeniably notable South Blooming Grove, New York (a recently incorporated village) when I suggested he take a few minutes to do so to avert a developing revert war — yet it didn't seem to be such a problem to him to create an article on a far less notable toponym. So I hit the afd template. I am withdrawing this nom because now it seems to me that I should have just made it a redirect to begin with and avoided this whole thing. We have a little info that is sourced that we can add to the Scotchtown article, and that's all we need. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I think I've made pretty clear already why I think covering it (as anything more than a link to an appropriate Orange County or Wallkill article) in the Scotchtown article is, in my view, not the preferable course of action. As for the conflict you're having with RMc, I hope it's settled down a bit, and think it quite unfortunate that not only did the conflict cause this AfD, but also got dragged into the heat of it.  This, after all, is not RfC.  Tom e rtalk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Eastmain, hamlets and similar settlements are inherently notable. RFerreira 06:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't call this place a settlement. Once it was, perhaps. Not now. Daniel Case 17:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Once upon a time the Songhai, Mali and Munhumutapa Empires were among the largest empires in Africa; Tuva and Adiabene were once countries. The Avars, Sarmatians, and Scythians were once among the most powerful peoples in eastern Europe.  None of these any longer exist.  Should they be erased from Wikipedia too?  There's no primary source evidence that Atlantis ever existed.  Surely it can't warrant an article...after all, Daniel Case has never been there!  Obviously this crossroads in rural NY was never a large empire or home to a powerful people, nor yet the subject of Plato's writings, but the point is made that today's notability is not a rational basis for declaring the place to be unwikipædic.  Tom e rtalk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Response. The sound of straws being clutched at, and apples and oranges being compared, as you yourself tacitly concede concede. I see nothing in the intersection's past history that suggests that, even if it doesn't exist today as a going community, it should be included. Just a cute local joke the meaning of which resides in history. This is otherwise too indiscriminate and crufty to merit a separate article. If we ever had a wiki devoted to Orange County, New York, yes, I'd give it a separate article there. But it's really just notable to local historians. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I think we've covered this already, elsewhere in the discussion. Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment. Other references to Michigan Corners include http://www.empirestateroads.com/cr/crorange.html and http://www.placenames.com/us/p957068/ --Eastmain 06:27, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Our main source for notability on places has been the U.S. Census Bureau names. They know which ones are real places where people live and which ones the USGS just keeps on its maps. Why don't you create Seager, New York, then, based on this? It was a small hamlet that vanished when tanning in the Catskills ended in the late 19th century. Today there is nothing there save one house and a hiking trailhead (I have been there enough to know). There are almost no records on it that would be conducive to the writing of a quality encylopedic article. It never existed as an independent political entity (much like Michigan Corners). It is properly dealt with on Wikipedia as a mention in Hardenburgh, New York. But I suppose it turns up in maps and on the other websites, so we should have an article about it, right? Daniel Case 17:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You're using your own life experience as an argument concerning notability. That is WP:OR of the worst kind.  Definitely, Seager should be mentioned; as I said above, in an appropriate article.  If not in Seager, New York, then in Former communities of the Catskills or Former communities of Ulster County, New York.   Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  22:02, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Does the fact that those articles are redlinked tell you something? I didn't mean for you to actually do this ... that's either WP:BEANS on me or WP:POINT on you. Or both. In any event, I would consider lists of such communities needlessly redundant, when they and what can be told of their histories can be easily dealt with in articles about the towns (in NY, anyway) or townships most of them are/were located in, or the towns' histories as daughter articles. In any event, I'll make the Seager article a redirect before someone else nominates it.  Also, one's own life experience, nor indeed any assertion in an article, is not OR if you back it up with photographs to make your point. Daniel Case 03:19, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes. Redlinks to me mean an article needs to be written yet.  I wasn't proposing a list of such communities, I was proposing an article that would cover them.  Wait... were you the one grasping at straws? ;-)  Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * It fell on you because you're the one who seems most interested in the subject. :-)  Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * And I'm the one who wanted to delete the article. Not a great argument for notability. Daniel Case 06:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

And why are we even having this discussion here anyway? Since I've changed my mind about outright deleting the article, there is no deletion remaining to discuss. The issue now is whether to make it a redirect or keep it as a separate article, which should be discussed on the article's talk page. Are our admins that busy that they can't close deletion debates that have clearly achieved some sort of consensus not to delete? Daniel Case 13:07, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, if for no other reason that the whole thing is driving Danny insane. RMc 10:59, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Not a valid reason to keep :-) Also, you can't vote twice without at least striking through your other vote and noting there that you've changed your mind. Daniel Case 13:03, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I see he's stricken his earlier !vote tho, so that at least is mootified for now.  :-) Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd have closed it already, but by the time you withdrew it, I was already an involved party, so my closing it would have (rightly so) been regarded as "improper"...that said, any uninvolved editor can close this AfD...it doesn't have to be an admin, since there's clearly no consensus to delete (something only admins can do). I think the best place to take this up, however, as I mentioned above, would be at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New York, since the editors there are probably much more capable of making a determination on this subject...a determination that will probably have ramifications far wider than the outcome of this AfD on one little stub has...  Cheers, Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  01:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
 * There isn't any discussion at the NY project talk page yet. I have sort of been advised to just let it go with RMc, so I have. Any further discussion that I am interested in can be undertaken at Talk:Scotchtown, New York. Daniel Case 06:08, 8 May 2007 (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.