Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2018 April 9

= April 9 =

Canberra
Is Canberra generally considered to be just in the ACT, or can it be construed (for statistical purposes, in particular) to embrace surrounding parts of NSW? Our articles on the Australian capitals generally cover the metropolitan areas; there's a reason Sydney metropolitan area redirects to Sydney, for example. With this in mind, I was doubtful, but not enough to be certain, when I noticed that List of Australian capital cities provides a Canberra population that's higher than that of the whole ACT. Of course, the ACT is mostly Canberra, but the Jervis Bay Territory can't have a negative population. So should I assume that population figures for "Canberra" include adjoining areas, like Sutton, Queanbeyan, and eight people at Tralee? Or is this a mistake or vandalism? The Canberra population is unsourced (a source is provided for the whole column, but the Canberra figure isn't in it), while the ACT population complies with the source; it's not as if someone just switched the two by mistake.

Related, but not the same question — why is so much of NSW-near-ACT undeveloped? Aside from Queanbeyan, it seems like basically nobody lives in NSW near the ACT, and some ACT developments stop at or near the border (Hume and Dunlop, in particular); is there some legal restriction on development in much of the border areas, or have developers just not developed those places?

Nyttend (talk) 01:03, 9 April 2018 (UTC)


 * It sounds like sourcing needs to be improved for those Canberra figures. As for development in that area, why would you expect it? If it hadn't been chosen as the site for the national capital, there would still probably be little but sheep in that whole area. There are no particular economic attractions there. HiLo48 (talk) 00:01, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

The Lady's Magazine and Musical Repository
I am trying to place an 1802 publication in context. Any clues welcome. I know that periodicals changed names as they merged with competitors, or one editor or publisher bought out another. At the moment I am interested in, it was called The Lady's Magazine and Musical Repository. I found it via this link. (The Hathi Trust categorises it as a musical periodical, but the magazine's table of contents shows it to be mostly prose.)

This appears to be an American publication. Presumably it is not connected to Ladies' Magazine, as our article says that began in 1828. Is it possibly a trans-Atlantic re-print (legitimate or pirated) of The Lady's Magazine? From our article:
 * The Lady's Magazine; or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex, Appropriated Solely to Their Use and Amusement, was an early British women's magazine published monthly from 1770 until 1847

Who was behind The Lady's Magazine and Musical Repository? The Hathi page says: "New York : Printed by G. & R. Waite for N. Bell, 1801-1802". But I do not know these names. Any help? Carbon Caryatid (talk) 17:33, 9 April 2018 (UTC)


 * The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association states that the publisher of The Lady's Magazine and Musical Repository was one Nathaniel Bell. According to that article, Martha Washington eventually became the owner of the magazine.
 * The directory of the American Bookbinders Museum has a "Nathaniel Bell, Bookseller, Stationer and Bookbinder [of] 438 Pearl Street, New York" who was active from 1796 until 1832 when his widow took over the business. He may or may not be your man. Alansplodge (talk) 20:24, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
 * The latter source also has a "G. & R. Waite, Printing, Book selling, Bookbinding, Patent Medicines & Lottery, [of] 64 & 38 Maiden Lane, New York". They also seem to have published, or at least printed, the New York edition of The Easy Instructor, one of two contemporary works which introduced the concept of shape note singing (it gets a mention in our article). See A History and Bibliography of the First Shape Note Tune Book (p. 36). A quick Google reveals that the Waites also printed an wide range of other books including an illustrated Bible in 1813.   Alansplodge (talk) 20:45, 9 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you. It's intriguing to find the info via Mount Vernon. I don't read their entry as meaning that the First Lady owned the magazine, in the sense of publishing it, though she was indeed an astute businesswoman. I think the librarians are just asserting that she owned a copy. ("Martha Washington's interest in these magazines may have begun in 1793 when the Philadelphia editors of The Lady's Magazine, and Repository of Entertaining Knowledge, presented their first volume to her. She later owned this New York publication, The Lady's Magazine and Musical Repository.") So that still leaves open the question of who owned and edited the Repository: who was this Nathaniel Bell? Any more leads welcome. I'm curious about the background and politics of Bell and any other owners or editors. Carbon Caryatid (talk) 10:30, 10 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Ah yes, rereading the source, I'm sure that you're right about Martha owning that copy rather than the whole enterprise. If the bookbindersmuseum.org entry is the same bloke, he doesn't seem to have been very notable, just an astute entrepreneur. Alansplodge (talk) 10:10, 12 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Register of artists, engravers, booksellers, bookbinders, printers & publishers in New York city, 1633-1820 (p. 10) has a list of NY addresses for Nathaniel Bell and also records a short-lived partnership with a Mr Smith (first name unrecorded) in 1799-1800. This exhausts anything Google could find for me. Alansplodge (talk) 16:22, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

Re: 2018 Gaza border protests (Great March of Return and the Day of the Tire)
I noticed in Talk:2018 Gaza border protests, the article was listed as high importance to WikiProject Palestine. Are these protests now an important part of the history of Palestine, Palestinians, or the "Palestinian cause"? I am just curious as to why this is considered high importance when, to my ignorant, armchair American a**, it seems like just another tragic manifestation of the Israeli-Arab conflict that has been ongoing since the early 20th century. This is especially odd since Talk:2014 Israel–Gaza conflict is listed as mid-importance. I know this is probably a thing to bring up in the respective talk pages, I am just wondering if this conflict is especially important to Palestinian history. 108.245.173.217 (talk) 19:43, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
 * It's just the most recent in a long list of conflicts between Israeli tanks and snipers vs rock throwing and mirror holding protesters. Besides recentism, it's not that important to the conflict. Of 19 (talk) 20:56, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Ah. Okay. 108.245.173.217 (talk) 01:37, 10 April 2018 (UTC)