Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Iowa/Archive 7

WikiWomen's History Month
Hi everyone. March is Women's History Month and I'm hoping a few folks here at WP:Iowa will have interest in putting on events (on and off wiki) related to women's roles in Iowa's history, society and culture. We've created an event page on English Wikipedia (please translate!) and I hope you'll find the inspiration to participate. These events can take place off wiki, like edit-a-thons, or on wiki, such as themes and translations. Please visit the page here: WikiWomen's History Month. Thanks for your consideration and I look forward to seeing events take place! SarahStierch (talk) 00:09, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Villisca Axe Murders articles
I have been working on cleaning up the Villisca Axe Murders article. As the article had information irrelevant to the crime and investigation, I moved some of the content to a new article, Josiah B. and Sara Moore House. I have added Iowa-related stubs to the article and the WikiProject Iowa to the talk page.

I find the story very interesting, but unfortunately the original article lacks proper citations. I have found a few sources for national newspapers from 1912 to around 1930. These cover the trial and some of the investigation, but I have found little that covers the investigation to detail that has been written in the Wikipedia article. Is there anyone who has access to quality sources of information?

Cheers. Encycloshave (talk) 04:21, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Commons legislative galleries
In case anyone's interested, I've created a few Commons galleries for Iowa legislators for the 81st through 84th General Assemblies. See Iowa State Senators of the 84th General Assembly and Members of the Iowa House of Representatives of the 84th General Assembly for examples. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 23:36, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Town Photo Collection Now Available
Hi Iowa Wikipedians! Long time. Just wanted to let you know that I have finally put my collection of 7204 photographs from 213 towns in 59 counties in Iowa on line. These include general town photos (of varying quality), as well as NRHP buildings. They all have the Creative Commons CC BY-NC 3.0 license. They can be found at: http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/cdm/search/collection/iowatowns

For a variety of reasons, I can't Wikipedia anymore, but I'd love to see these photos go to good use. Peace, Bill Whittaker (talk) 15:26, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Here is a list of all the towns: Ackley, Iowa, Adair, Iowa, Allison, Iowa, Altoona, Iowa, Anamosa, Iowa, Ankeny, Iowa, Aplington, Iowa, Argyle, Iowa, Atkins, Iowa, Austinville, Iowa, Ballyclough, Iowa, Belle Plaine, Iowa, Blairsburg, Iowa, Boone Forks, Iowa, Brandon, Iowa, Brighton, Iowa, Buckeye, Iowa, Burlington, Iowa, Canoe Ridge, Iowa, Cascade, Iowa, Cedar, Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Charter Oak, Iowa, Chester, Iowa, Clarksville, Iowa, Clear Lake, Iowa, Colfax, Iowa, Columbus Junction, Iowa, Coppock, Iowa, Coralville, Iowa, Cotter, Iowa, Council Bluffs, Iowa, Dakota City, Iowa, Davenport, Iowa, Dayton, Iowa, Decorah, Iowa, Defiance, Iowa, Denison, Iowa, Denmark, Iowa, Denver, Iowa, Des Moines, Iowa, DeSoto, Iowa, Dike, Iowa, Donnellson, Iowa, Dubuque, Iowa, Dyersville, Iowa, Early, Iowa, Fairfield, Iowa, Fertile, Iowa, Festina, Iowa, Fillmore, Iowa, Floyd, Iowa, Fort Atkinson, Iowa, Fort Dodge, Iowa, Fort Madison, Iowa, Franklin, Iowa, Fredonia, Iowa, Freeport, Iowa, Fremont, Iowa, Frytown, Iowa, Garnavillo, Iowa, Glenwood, Iowa, Grandview, Iowa, Grinnell, Iowa, Guttenberg, Iowa, Hardscrabble, Iowa, Harlan, Iowa, Haskins, Iowa, Hedrick, Iowa, Hills, Iowa, Homestead, Iowa, Humboldt, Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, Iowa Falls, Iowa, Irving, Iowa, Janesville, Iowa, Joice, Iowa, Kalona, Iowa, Keokuk, Iowa, Keota, Iowa, Kingston, Iowa, Kinross, Iowa, La Crew, Iowa, Ladora, Iowa, Lake Mills, Iowa, Lancaster, Iowa, Le Grand, Iowa, Lehigh, Iowa, Lime Springs, Iowa, Linby, Iowa, Linn Grove, Iowa, Lisbon, Iowa, Lockridge, Iowa, Lowell, Iowa, Luxemburg, Iowa, Lytton, Iowa, Maharishi Vedic City, Iowa, Malcom, Iowa, Marengo, Iowa, Marion, Iowa, Marquette, Iowa, Martelle, Iowa, Martinsburg, Iowa, Maynard, Iowa, McGregor, Iowa, Mediapolis, Iowa, Millville, Iowa, Milo, Iowa, Missouri Valley, Iowa, Modale, Iowa, Mondamin, Iowa, Monroe, Iowa, Monticello, Iowa, Montrose, Iowa, Moorhead, Iowa, Morning Sun, Iowa, Morse, Iowa, Mount Pleasant, Iowa, Mount Vernon, Iowa, Mt. Hamill, Iowa, National, Iowa, New Boston, Iowa, New Hampton, Iowa, New London, Iowa, New Vienna, Iowa, Noble, Iowa, Oakville, Iowa, Oelwein, Iowa, Olds, Iowa, Ollie, Iowa, Orchard, Iowa, Osage, Iowa, Oskaloosa, Iowa, Otho, Iowa, Otley, Iowa, Oxford, Iowa, Pacific Junction, Iowa, Packwood, Iowa, Palo, Iowa, Parkers Grove, Iowa, Parkersburg, Iowa, Pella, Iowa, Peterson, Iowa, Pisgah, Iowa, Pleasant Plain, Iowa, Pomeroy, Iowa, Prairie City, Iowa, Readlyn, Iowa, Richland, Iowa, Roberts, Iowa, Rochester, Iowa, Rome, Iowa, Rubio, Iowa, Rudd, Iowa, Rutland, Iowa, Sac City, Iowa, Salem, Iowa, Sawyer, Iowa, Shell Rock, Iowa, Shellsburg, Iowa, Shueyville, Iowa, Sigourney, Iowa, Sioux City, Iowa, Sioux Rapids, Iowa, Sixteen, Iowa, Soldier, Iowa, Solon, Iowa, South Amana, Iowa, South English, Iowa, Spillville, Iowa, Spillville Mill, Iowa, Springdale, Iowa, St. Ansgar, Iowa, Stacyville, Iowa, Stone City, Iowa, Storm Lake, Iowa, Stratford, Iowa, Sutliff, Iowa, Swedesburg, Iowa, Swisher, Iowa, Tama, Iowa, Timber Ridge, Iowa, Toeterville, Iowa, Toledo, Iowa, Toolesboro, Iowa, Urbana, Iowa, Ute, Iowa, Volney, Iowa, Walcott, Iowa, Walford, Iowa, Walnut, Iowa, Wapello, Iowa, Washington, Iowa, Waterloo, Iowa, Waukon, Iowa, Waverly, Iowa, Wayland, Iowa, Webster, Iowa, Wellman, Iowa, West Branch, Iowa, West Liberty, Iowa, West Point, Iowa, West Union, Iowa, Westfield, Iowa, Wever, Iowa, Williams, Iowa, Winfield, Iowa, Winterset, Iowa, Worthington, Iowa, Wyman, Iowa, and Yarmouth, Iowa.


 * Unfortunately, that NC license makes them "fair use" photos on Wikipedia. The only restrictions we accept here are BY and SA.  – Philosopher Let us reason together. 23:51, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Great news! The images have been re-licensed as CC-BY-SA 4.0, so they can be used here freely.  – Philosopher Let us reason together. 21:05, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Expert attention
This is a notice about Category:Iowa articles needing expert attention, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. It will take a while before the category is populated. Iceblock (talk) 21:46, 18 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the notice! – Philosopher Let us reason together. 23:53, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

To do
I've updated the project's to do list with some ideas, just in case anyone finds themselves wanting some more work. – Philosopher Let us reason together. 23:53, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

List of county courthouses in Iowa
Created Template:County courthouses in Iowa. --Southern Iowan (talk) 14:04, 10 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Awesome! – Philosopher Let us reason together. 00:13, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

RM: Barry Davis (amateur wrestler)
Greetings! I have recently relisted a requested move discussion at Talk:Barry Davis (amateur wrestler), regarding a page relating to this WikiProject. Discussion and opinions are invited. Thanks, –Chase (talk / contribs) 22:23, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Board of Regents
I have created an article for the state's board of regents. I was wondering how we should deal with this stylistically on other pages. Should we accept Iowa Board of Regents as an acceptable reference, or always stick to the official name, which is Board of Regents, State of Iowa? Your input is appreciated! Medtion (talk) 20:45, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Late comment, I know, but I would prefer "Iowa Board of Regents", for the article title as being closer to the WP:COMMONNAME. – Philosopher Let us reason together. 17:40, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Suggestion
Hello all! I was curious if anyone else thought it might be a good idea to make a (nonbinding) guideline on how all the individual US state WikiProjects should organize themselves, to help standardize them. I originally put this suggestion in the WikiProject United States talk page, so feel free to look there if you're interested. It's pretty empty though; basically all they said was to see what each of the individual projects thought about it. Please tell me if you have any concerns with this idea; hopefully we can find a way for everyone to love it! Also, I'm new at making proposals, so please forgive me if I do anything silly. :) Hope that you like this idea! JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 04:55, 3 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Different WikiProjects serve different purposes (see my post at WikiProject X/Stories/Archive 1), so I don't think a single guideline or suggested template would be a good idea, even if non-binding. A list of "available elements for Project design" might be handy, I suppose, but I suspect that many Project designers already look at existing projects to see what features they think will be most useful to their own project. – Philosopher Let us reason together. 20:16, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Iowa geography stubs
Howdy all - I've been sorting through the 1,300+ stub articles on geographic locations in the great state of Iowa and I need your advice. It would be helpful for stub sorters if we could figure out how to split Iowa on the regional level, so that we'd have (for example) "Northern Iowa geographical stubs" as a parent of stub articles for places in those counties that fall into that region. ANYWAY... long story short, can you recommend a source for us to determine what constitutes Iowa's regions? Thanks for any advice you can give me. Cheers, Pegship (talk) 00:54, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Talk:Atlantic High School (Iowa)
Hi, there is a discussion on a page of interest to your project regarding a page split and titling issue. Please add your knowledge to the discussion. Thanks. John from Idegon (talk) 08:46, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

Auto-assessment of article classes
Following a recent discussion at WP:VPR, there is consensus for an opt-in bot task that automatically assesses the class of articles based on classes listed for other project templates on the same page. In other words, if WikiProject A has evaluated an article to be C-class and WikiProject B hasn't evaluated the article at all, such a bot task would automatically evaluate the article as C-class for WikiProject B.

If you think auto-assessment might benefit this project, consider discussing it with other members here. For more information or to request an auto-assessment run, please visit User:BU RoBOT/autoassess. This is a one-time message to alert projects with over 1,000 unassessed articles to this possibility. ~ RobTalk 22:31, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

US 50,000 Challenge invite
Hi. The WikiProject United States/The 50,000 Challenge has recently started, based on the UK/Ireland The 10,000 Challenge. The idea is not to record every minor edit, but to create a momentum to motivate editors to produce good content improvements and creations and inspire people to work on more states than they might otherwise work on. If there's the interest I will start 1000 State Challenges like The 1000 Challenge (Nordic). For this to really work we need diversity and exciting content and editors from a broad range of states regularly contributing. If you would like to see masses of articles being improved for the US and your specialist/home state like WikiProject Africa/The Africa Destubathon, sign up today and once the challenge starts a contest can be organized. This is a way we can target every state, and steadily vastly improve the encyclopedia. We need numbers to make this work so consider signing up as a participant and also sign under any state sub challenge on the page that you might contribute to! Thankyou.♦ Dr. Blofeld  15:15, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Popular pages report
We – Community Tech – are happy to announce that the Popular pages bot is back up-and-running (after a one year hiatus)! You're receiving this message because your WikiProject or task force is signed up to receive the popular pages report. Every month, will post at /Popular pages with a list of the most-viewed pages over the previous month that are within the scope of. We've made some enhancements to the original report. Here's what's new:
 * The pageview data includes both desktop and mobile data.
 * The report will include a link to the pageviews tool for each article, to dig deeper into any surprises or anomalies.
 * The report will include the total pageviews for the entire project (including redirects).

We're grateful to for his original, and we wish his bot a happy robot retirement. Just as before, we hope the popular pages reports will aid you in understanding the reach of, and what articles may be deserving of more attention. If you have any questions or concerns please contact us at m:User talk:Community Tech bot.

Warm regards, the Community Tech Team 17:16, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Template:Iowa_County,_Iowa
Hi guys,

Can someone please take a look at Template:Iowa_County,_Iowa? The map is supposed to show Iowa County highlighted in red, but instead shows the whole state highlighted in red (compare with other county navigation boxes). I suspect there's a file naming conflict somewhere, since the code in the template is correct. 67.1.148.36 (talk) 18:50, 24 February 2018 (UTC)

New Iowa userbox templates
New Iowa userbox templates are now available at Template:User WP Iowa and Template:User WP United States. Yours aye, Buaidh  talk contribs 22:38, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

WikiProject collaboration notice from the Portals WikiProject
The reason I am contacting you is because there are one or more portals that fall under this subject, and the Portals WikiProject is currently undertaking a major drive to automate portals that may affect them.

Portals are being redesigned.

The new design features are being applied to existing portals.

At present, we are gearing up for a maintenance pass of portals in which the introduction section will be upgraded to no longer need a subpage. In place of static copied and pasted excerpts will be self-updating excerpts displayed through selective transclusion, using the template Transclude lead excerpt.

The discussion about this can be found here.

Maintainers of specific portals are encouraged to sign up as project members here, noting the portals they maintain, so that those portals are skipped by the maintenance pass. Currently, we are interested in upgrading neglected and abandoned portals. There will be opportunity for maintained portals to opt-in later, or the portal maintainers can handle upgrading (the portals they maintain) personally at any time.

Background
On April 8th, 2018, an RfC ("Request for comment") proposal was made to eliminate all portals and the portal namespace. On April 17th, the Portals WikiProject was rebooted to handle the revitalization of the portal system. On May 12th, the RfC was closed with the result to keep portals, by a margin of about 2 to 1 in favor of keeping portals.

There's an article in the current edition of the Signpost interviewing project members about the RfC and the Portals WikiProject.

Since the reboot, the Portals WikiProject has been busy building tools and components to upgrade portals.

So far, 84 editors have joined.

If you would like to keep abreast of what is happening with portals, see the newsletter archive.

If you have any questions about what is happening with portals or the Portals WikiProject, please post them on the WikiProject's talk page.

Thank you. &mdash; The Transhumanist  07:42, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:IAMilitary
Template:IAMilitary has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. DH85868993 (talk) 05:57, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

RfC on election/referendum naming format
An RfC on moving the year from the end to the start of article titles (e.g. South African general election, 2019 to 2019 South African general election) has been reopened for further comment, including on whether a bot could be used move the articles if it closed in favour of the change: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (government and legislation). Cheers, Number   5  7  15:45, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:IA listed at Redirects for discussion
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect IA. Interested editors may want to participate in the redirect discussion if they have not already done so. — Godsy (TALK CONT ) 20:32, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

When making articles on Iowa school districts, make sure the district legally exists
Hi! I know there aren't many watchers here, but I thought I'd talk about Iowa school districts. I've written about both current and former school districts, and I'd like to talk about making sure a school district you're writing about legally exists.

Lately many Iowa school districts have consolidated with one another, and the State of Iowa maintains a list of school district consolidations since 1965. Often what the districts do is they form "grade-sharing" agreements in which two existing school districts send each other's students to the other's school. For example District A operates a single elementary school for students in district A and B, while District B operates the middle-high school. They may have a joint website and present themselves as a single school district, such as "AB School District." West Fork Community School District stated 2008 was its start year as its predecessor districts signed a grade-sharing agreement and opened a common high school.

However in this grade-sharing scenario, one should at first retain having two separate articles, because the school districts are still legally separate with their own boards of education which can make their own decisions. West Fork district didn't actually exist as a single district with its own single school board until 2011. In addition, even though Farragut School District and Hamburg School District presented themselves as a "Nishnabotna School District", they were still independent districts with their own minds, as Hamburg actually voted to stop using the Farragut superintendent (the two were sharing the same superintendent).

The actual consolidation will come if/when residents in both districts vote, with a majority (usually?) to consolidate. The two school boards will legally become one, and the State of Iowa will now count the districts as merged in that lovely PDF file. However this doesn't always come: Farragut and Hamburg held a vote on consolidating, but Hamburg residents voted it down. Then Farragut fell afoul of State of Iowa Education authorities (for financial difficulties). The State forced it to close and divided its land among other districts. The two school districts are not truly one until the district populations vote to merge!

If, for example, there are two districts presenting themselves as "AB School District" and you feel you need an article with that title, why not make an article on the high school and redirect "AB School District" to "AB High School"? (for example I redirected Nishnabotna Community School District to Nishnabotna High School) Then if a successful vote happens, you can move the "AB High School" article to "AB School District" and rewrite the page to be about the newly-formed district. WhisperToMe (talk) 19:01, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

WP 1.0 Bot Beta
Hello! Your WikiProject has been selected to participate in the WP 1.0 Bot rewrite beta. This means that, starting in the next few days or weeks, your assessment tables will be updated using code in the new bot, codenamed Lucky. You can read more about this change on the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team page. Thanks! audiodude (talk) 06:49, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

Jackson County landmark
could benefit from input from someone in or with knowledge of Jackson County. Thanks! —[ Alan M 1 (talk) ]— 09:32, 19 April 2019 (UTC)

MfD nomination of Portal:Iowa
Portal:Iowa, a page which you created or substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; you may participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Iowa and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes ( ~ ). You are free to edit the content of Portal:Iowa during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:27, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Request for information on WP1.0 web tool
Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Article request: Housing in Iowa
Wikipedia readers would be grateful if your project would consider creating a new article about Housing in Iowa. Here are some sources of information: Best regards, -- M2545 (talk) 17:02, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Category:Housing in Iowa
 * (assorted materials)
 * (assorted materials)
 * (assorted materials)
 * (assorted materials)
 * (assorted materials)
 * (assorted materials)

Scotch Grove
Is Scotch Grove Township, Jones County, Iowa about the same place as Scotch Grove, Iowa? --PeterR2 (talk) 20:44, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

Category:Iowa articles needing expert attention has been nominated for discussion
Category:Iowa articles needing expert attention has been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. Peaceray (talk) 21:06, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Parent Project WP:USA
Due to the semi-active nature of the WP:Iowa, should we consider moving this into the WP:USA parent project? Most state WikiProjects have done this and it may help keep the WP active. Etriusus (talk) 20:58, 7 July 2021 (UTC) EDIT: Correction, move our membership list into WP:USA's page.

FAR
I have nominated Armament of the Iowa-class battleship for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. TomStar81 (Talk) 12:16, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

User script to detect unreliable sources
I have (with the help of others) made a small user script to detect and highlight various links to unreliable sources and predatory journals. Some of you may already be familiar with it, given it is currently the 39th most imported script on Wikipedia. The idea is that it takes something like and turns it into something like
 * John Smith "Article of things" Deprecated.com. Accessed 2020-02-14.
 * John Smith "Article of things" Deprecated.com. Accessed 2020-02-14.

It will work on a variety of links, including those from cite web, cite journal and doi.

The script is mostly based on WP:RSPSOURCES, WP:NPPSG and WP:CITEWATCH and a good dose of common sense. I'm always expanding coverage and tweaking the script's logic, so general feedback and suggestions to expand coverage to other unreliable sources are always welcomed.

Do note that this is not a script to be mindlessly used, and several caveats apply. Details and instructions are available at User:Headbomb/unreliable. Questions, comments and requests can be made at User talk:Headbomb/unreliable.

- &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b}

This is a one time notice and can't be unsubscribed from. Delivered by: MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:01, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Request for assessment
Could someone PLEASE assesss my 2017 article Des Moines Water Works as obviously I cant do it myself ? Thank you !--Wuerzele (talk) 22:56, 14 February 2022 (UTC)
 * Done. I have some concerns about sourcing that keeps it from a B class but solid work overall. I occasionally patrol this page but the project is functionally inactive. Etriusus 02:46, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Pictures of Dubuque county
As there are no pictures of these towns, I am requesting for some.


 * Asbury
 * Balltown
 * Bankston
 * Bernard
 * Centralia
 * Durango
 * Graf
 * Sageville
 * Worthington
 * Zwingle

If you have pictures of these, upload them and please notify me. Mitch199811 (talk) 01:16, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

Dixie, Iowa
The redirect Dixie, Iowa is currently being discussed at Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 January 17, where additional input has been requested. Thryduulf (talk) 19:12, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Iowa legislator ID property proposal at Wikidata
A Wikidata property for Iowa legislators is proposed at Wikidata:Property proposal/Iowa legislator ID. Feel free to offer feedback. --Animalparty! (talk) 05:55, 31 January 2023 (UTC)