Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sheila Gallagher


 * 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   convert to disambig to City of London School and merge what we can into said article. I'd appreciate it if somebody else can do this for me; I've got to run. Master of Puppets - Call me MoP! :D  03:04, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Sheila Gallagher

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The main source for this article is a school newsletter. The only credible claim to notability is that she has an MBE. WP:ANYBIO suggests that a "a notable award or honor" might be a valid reason for notability. However, the Order of the British Empire is given to a lot of people each year, so I'm not sure that a lower level MBE is "notable" in itself. I couldn't find any reliable sources, other than mirrors of the Wikipedia article. The main argument for keeping this is that it's a quirky and likable article - but that's probably the start of a slippery slope.  SilkTork  *YES! 16:44, 16 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep. Second-guessing the merits of apparently notable awards will lead to much more trouble than it's worth, and I have great difficulty believing that these awards are in general less notable than, say, the members of Category:Pornographic_film_awards or the many beauty pageant honors that Wikipedia catalogs. There are users out there who will want to be able to look up every recipient, just as there are those who want to be able to look up every major league baseball player. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 21:46, 16 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I can see some point in having a List of MBE recipients - but even that we don't have, as the number of MBE recipients goes into the thousands, and such a list might violate WP:NOTDIRECTORY and WP:NLIST; but having an article on each MBE recipient would not be possible as there is not enough information. I believe that those in Category:Members of the Order of the British Empire are already notable for something other than their MBE. Also bear in mind that most newspapers when reporting the New Years List, will pick out the most notable, and ignore the rest, as in this example. This article needs to stand by the basic criteria. I don't think the lower ranks of the Order of the British Empire count as notable. While The Times publishes the full list, being a name on list is not "significant coverage". And bear in mind that local papers publish the names of students who have been granted a university degree, and we don't have an article on every person who have been awarded a degree, even though we could find at least two reliable sources to verify each claim (the local newspaper and the university).  SilkTork  *YES! 10:13, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Ron Ritzman (talk) 01:32, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of England-related deletion discussions.  -- Ron Ritzman (talk) 01:34, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Weak delete . All of the references are broken links so most of this in unverifiable. I did find one hit on GNews from the Evening Standard which backs up the claim of being the City of London's only lollipop lady, but I'm not sure this is a good enough claim without a proper stab at the WP:GNG. (One article in the Evening Standard isn't enough.) For me, the decider is that the article is so horribly unencyclopaedic, and the notability is so iffy, that if there is an article to be made out of this you might as well delete the whole lot and start all over again. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 08:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: I've since fixed the broken links. Qwfp (talk) 09:47, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Hmm ... Apart from the Evening Standard Coverage, most of the rest of the coverage seems to come from City Lights, which is the newsletter of the City of London School, which she's sort of associated with ... Okay, merge with this article, into the Notable People section, unless someone has a better idea for where to put it. All we really need to know is that she's the only lollipop lady in the City on London and she got an MBE for her service. Her remarks on the opening of the Millennium Bridge, whilst appropriate for the Evening Standard article, are really too trivial for an encyclopaedia. Chris Neville-Smith (talk) 11:25, 23 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep Per Hullaballoo. Mrs. Wolpoff (talk) 15:14, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Hullaballoo's argument amounts to saying that other stuff exists which is less notable. She's a crossing guard, who has managed a very small place on the honours list at a very low level of distinction, which is awarded to hundreds of thousands of people . Her enduring historical notability is basically zero. Wikipedia is not meant for trivia or directories. Ray  Talk 21:16, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. You're misreading my argument. There's a big difference between "other stuff exists" which is less notable and "other stuff exists" which is less notable, but is recognized by consensus as notable enough for Wikipedia. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 21:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Reply You're making a comparison to other stuff, nonetheless. We should address notability of the subject of the article independently, rather than sinking to lowest-common-denominator thinking. Ray  Talk 22:06, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Multiple non-trivial stories in mainstream press = notable. --Tagishsimon (talk) 21:49, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment I count major stories in a school newspaper (hopefully not redefined as mainstream press, whatever one thinks of the quality of mainstream press these days), a passing mention in the Evening Standard where she's quoted in one paragraph about a bridge, and being included on the honours reporting lists for the Times and the Herald, purely in list form. I don't consider getting quoted, and being included in a list, nontrivial. Ray  Talk 22:09, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree that "Multiple non-trivial stories in mainstream press = notable", but we don't have that situation in this case. As Ray points out above, the main newspaper source is the school paper, and The Times simply lists her name along with hundreds of other people.  SilkTork  *YES! 22:45, 24 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Convert to disambig page something like:
 * Sheila Gallagher may refer to:
 * Sheila Gallagher MBE, school crossing patrol officer for the City of London School in central London, England
 * Sheila Jackson (previously Sheila Gallagher), a character in the British TV drama Shameless


 * I agree with above arguments that an MBE is too minor and awardees too numerous for that alone to confer automatic notability per WP:ANYBIO, and that there isn't the significant coverage in independent reliable sources to meet WP:BIO. There's a hatnote concerning the Shameless character on the article already, so if the article were deleted we'd need to re-create a redirect or a disambig page. I can't see any need to delete the article's history first, and not doing so leaves the editors of City of London School free to re-use some of the present text if they so choose. Qwfp (talk) 11:36, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
 * This makes sense. I support this solution.  SilkTork  *YES! 15:55, 27 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment -- I have grave doubts as to whether the award of an MBE qualifies a person as notable: a lot are awarded, but this issue cannot be addreesed in the context of an AFD for a particular recipient. However a number of dab pages that I created have subsequently been deleted: if there are only two entries a capnote does the job better.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:44, 29 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Her reputation is almost limited, only within the city. 98.119.158.59 (talk) 02:33, 31 August 2009 (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.