Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Youngstown, Ohio


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 03:02, 26 November 2007.

Youngstown, Ohio
previous FAC

This article has been vastly improved since the last nomination, and most of the previous comments have been taken into consideration. Over 250 edits have been made since that time to improve the quality of the article. There are ample inline citations, over 80, with a very clear and concise writing style. Ample photographs are included in the article to visually highlight some of the writing. To the best of my knowledge, all tables and templates meet Wikipedia's standards in formatting and design. I would appreciate your vote to approve this as a Featured Article. --Daysleeper47 14:48, 22 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment I think you should change "Challenging old verities" to crime . Looking in the contents list one would have no idea where the crime section was located. Also, what does "Challenging old verities" mean anyway? Challenging old truth? You are talking about crime, might as well call it that. Every other city does. KnightLago 17:04, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Support I agree with the above recommending that the section name be changed.  Perhaps "Crime reputation".  This section is good because it's honest.  The city has been associated with gangsters, at least in the past.  In wikipedia, all we want is honesty, not falsely positive or negative articles. Good article!  How did al-Bireh become sister city?  Any ideas? Mrs.EasterBunny 20:35, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Response to query Regarding al-Bireh, I don't know the details. I can tell you that Youngstown has a large Palestinian-born population. This may account for the sister city relationship with al-Bireh. twelsht 21:14, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Pass & support Remark: Attractions is pretty hefty. Are we trying to sell the town? Leranedo 02:30, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
 * On the basis that it's decent.

 Oppose Support—''It's quite good now; I've made a few tweaks; can you change the hyphens to proper minus signs for the temperatures, in two tables (or en dashes, but the former are below the edit box as a 'click', which can be copied and pasted after the first one). One "United States" among otherwise consistent "U.S."''. Check what "poverty line" means—is it linkable to a specific US p l?'' 1a. Here are random samples of the need to bring on board a copy-editor or two with a track-record in similar good articles (research FAs, edit histories and summaries).
 * ✅"when the U.S. steel industry shifted production overseas in the 1970s"—Now are you sure that this doesn't oversimplify the transition? Perhaps there was a degree of direct capital transfer to low-cost economies by the local companies, but I suspect that most of the "rust belt" phenomenon occurred through just import competition and plain job and market loss, without directd "shift of production".
 * ✅ Eight years ago is the most recent population estimate?
 * 2006 census estimate added


 * ✅ "comprises around 697,481 residents"—Sure it's not 697,481.6?
 * ✅ "is centrally located between New York City and Chicago"—no, "lies midway between".
 * ✅ "became a popular destination for immigrants from Eastern Europe, Italy, and Greece as well."—Why "as well"? Are we missing some point here? Straight after this, weed out the "also".
 * ✅ "Urban neighborhoods are dotted with religious landmarks including churches, synagogues, and mosques."—Wouldn't it be neater as just "Urban neighborhoods are dotted with churches, synagogues, and mosques."? Tony   (talk)  13:46, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Reply Tony, Thanks for your comments. They were fair and accurate. The decline of the U.S. steel industry was more complicated than the second paragraph suggested, and the article has stylistic weaknesses. After reading your comments, I made changes based on some of your recommendations. There is more work to be done. Here is a list of changes I've made so far:
 * modified misleading passage on decline of steel industry
 * included 2006 estimate of Youngstown's population (the next official census will be conducted in 2010)
 * added details on Connecticut Western Reserve--perhaps a brief description of Northwest Territory and CWR is in order
 * weeded out extraneous language (1st half of article)
 * modified awkward phrases and sentences (1st half of article)
 * I plan to look over the article tomorrow. Any further comments and recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks. - twelsht (talk) 03:50, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Note: Recommendations on ways to improve this article should be referred to Daysleeper47. Thanks. -- twelsht (talk) 13:11, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

Your style is just different, not better. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 18:00, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I remove my comment of objection. After reading it again, I apologize and have found them to be fair and substantive. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 17:19, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I share Daysleeper's concerns. A few of Tony's comments were helpful. He noted that an introductory statement on the decline of the U.S. steel industry was misleading. I modified this statement a few days ago. In response to another comment, I added a 2006 population estimate for the municipality. The issue of style is more subjective, but I acted on several of his recommendations. While this article would benefit from the input of a seasoned FA copy editor, it has already been through multiple peer reviews. Some reviewers described its narrative style as clear and concise. I hope that this article won't be held back on the basis of largely subjective concerns. While I can no longer participate in this process, I wanted to lend support to Daysleeper's comment. Thanks, again, for your feedback. Respectfully, twelsht (talk) 19:21, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Appreciation: This is a brief note of thanks to those who assessed Youngstown, Ohio. Participants in the Youngstown project are especially grateful to SandyGeorgia, who provided numerous sample edits and worked closely with us to improve the main article. Sincerely, twelsht (talk) 09:20, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Okay, by no means an expert in this field but, nevertheless, my comments follow for what they're worth!
 * Comments from
 * Note: I added comments and replied, and will add more as I have time. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 21:42, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * ✅ Lead is a little confusing, you have geography, then history then census then a little more geography.
 * Reply: I didn't add any new text, but I reordered it in a manner which I think is more organized. -Daysleeper47


 * ✅ Image:City seal.gif needs work. There's a fair use licence attributed without source or copyright information (see the precise wording of the template there) and the image is used in lots of articles - a fair use rationale needs to be added for each and every fair use.
 * Citations shouldn't have a space between them and what they're citing. Also they need to be placed immediately to the right of punctuation where possible - see WP:CITE.
 * ✅ Why a whole sentence in parentheses? In fact, there are a couple...
 * No need to repeatedly use same citation in consecutive sentences e.g. [30], [43].
 * "Many observers have pointed out, however, that Youngstown has yet to move into a "post-steel" economy." - one of the few sentences without a citation which really needs more than one!
 * ✅ I've no idea but is downtown usually capitalised or not? At least there should be some consistency within the article.
 * Reply: I only found one, perhaps someone corrected them before me. I left it lowercase unless it starts a sentence.


 * ✅ "...fiercest competitor..." sounds a bit peacock to me unless it's in the citation...
 * Reply: The word is not in the article, and has been removed. The article is not available for free, so I the byline and headline, found the article, and searched again with the word 'fiercest' and didn't find it -Daysleeper47


 * It seems like the last sentence of most sections have no citation.
 * ✅ "... several decades ago (in the mid-1960s)..." one or the other...
 * "...despite intermittent financial challenges." - citation required.
 * ✅ "This unusual museum..." what makes it unusual?
 * Reply: I removed the word 'unusual'. While the museum looks at working-class studies, it isn't unusual enough to warrant the word. -Daysleeper47


 * ✅ Big space toward the end of the Sports section, and if one of the boxers is redlinked, is he really notable? (not an accusation, more of a question!)
 * Reply: Greg Richardson is a notable bantamweight boxer with a 38-8-1 records.


 * ✅ Sports table seems a bit unexplained...
 * Reply: Agreed; table was removed as the table text was already explained in the article's main body. -Daysleeper47


 * ✅ "Observers note the absence of a single new car dealership operating within the city limits, and also observe that city residents are often forced to do their shopping in the surrounding suburbs of Boardman, Niles, Austintown, or Liberty Township." - again, "Observers note... etc" needs to be cited.
 * Reply: I removed the sentence. I couldn't find a reliable online citation and my book resources are currently unavailable. If I find something, I will re-add it. -Daysleeper47


 * ✅ Media section is entirely unreferenced.
 * Reply: I rewrote the section and include citations. I removed many of the bulleted lists and worked it into prose. -Daysleeper47

Please take all with a pinch of salt, I'm more used to reading and writing about footballers so I may not have got the hang of this! Let me know if I can help in any way. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:30, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

FYI: Because of the Thanksgiving holiday, I will be out of town until Sunday morning and have little internet access to follow this FA-nom. I made many of the changes suggested and hope to follow up with the rest after I return. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 02:21, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.