Talk:John Neal bibliography

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by MeegsC (talk) 13:47, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

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• Article history

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• ... that the John Neal bibliography includes the first use of son-of-a-bitch in American fiction? Sources: Pages 46–47 of this book reads, "[John Neal] used the language of the day, including the phrase 'son of a bitch' well ahead of other writers." And page 46 of this book reads "Soon the language [of Seventy-Six by John Neal] will reveal itself in another way as the language of soldiers; profanity and oaths occur with an outspokenness appropriate to the occasion, but nonetheless surprising for the century. ... 'It was there ... I wheeled, made a dead set, at the son-of-a-bitch in my rear ....' Not until a century later was the same freedom allowed a writer; even the Twain of Roughing It reports a profane miner's oath as a 'son of a skunk.'"

• ALT1 ... that American fiction's first son-of-a-bitch is in the John Neal bibliography?
• ALT2 ... that the first son-of-a-bitch in American fiction is in the John Neal bibliography?
• Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Mr. Dick

Created by Dugan Murphy (talk). Self-nominated at 21:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook eligibility:

• Cited: - Offline/paywalled citation accepted in good faith
• Interesting:
• Other problems: - Good hook, could be more specific in mentioning the first occurrence is in Seventy-Six. Unsure if expletive has any bearing on DYK nomination.

QPQ: Done.

Overall: I am new to this review process and have requested that another editor check over this review. The nominated article looks good and the hook is interesting. Darfst (talk) 16:05, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

@Darfst: Thanks for reviewing! I'm fairly new at DYK reviews myself. One thing I've learned recently is that good hooks tend to leave a little mystery, as an incentive to read the article. With that in mind, I think I prefer ALT1 and feel comfortable with leaving out Seventy-Six from the hook. But I'd also be curious to hear a second opinion if you'd like input from another editor. As far as the expletive is concerned, my understanding is that DYK hooks are WP:NOTCENSORED like the rest of Wikipedia. Dugan Murphy (talk) 02:47, 15 April 2021 (UTC)

The term "bibliography", although part of the title of the article under review for DYK, seems awkward here. The bibliography, it seems to me, is the list of Neal's works, whereas the first use of the phrase is in one of the works themselves. Could we pipe the article title and say instead: "... that the writings of John Neal include the first use of the phrase "son-of-a-bitch" in American fiction?" --Metropolitan90 (talk) 19:04, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

@Metropolitan90: That's a great suggestion. How about ALT1a (below) for a hook?

• ALT1a ... that American fiction's first son-of-a-bitch is in the writings of John Neal?

@Metropolitan90 and Darfst: Any thoughts on the ALT1a hook? Any reason this nomination can't move forward? Dugan Murphy (talk) 02:24, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

• @Dugan Murphy: ALT1a works for me! Darfst (talk) 11:44, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

@Darfst: Great! I'm still fairly new at this like you are, but I believe you need to edit your review status above from "again" to "y" before an admin will close this review. You might also strikeout your comment about the hook so it's obvious to an admin looking at this that the issues you raised have been resolved. I just struckout the extraneous hooks to make ALT1a more obvious. Dugan Murphy (talk) 12:30, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

John or Johns Hopkins

@Naraht: You just changed the publisher of A History of the American Revolution from John Hopkins to John Hopkins. I actually have an antique copy of this book and it clearly says "John Hopkins" (no S) on the title page. Reading through Johns Hopkins, it looks like he was in the right city with the right amount of wealth to serve as publisher, even though his article doesn't say anything about it. Yet, I can't find any sources saying "John" was supposed to be "Johns". What is your rationale for your edit? Dugan Murphy (talk) 00:59, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Itym John Hopkins to Johns Hopkins. It didn't make sense to me (and I've been fixing John Hopkins to Johns Hopkins in a number of places) and especially since it was in Baltimore... I think that the cover page that you are talking https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwb3ga&seq=7 which I agree says John Hopkins. It is possible that is a mistake at the time, I agree the wikipedia page should be changed back and will do so.Naraht (talk) 01:13, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Sorry for not pinging Dugan Murphy. Let me know if the additional reference is helpful for being John Hopkins. Note another copy shows it being done for Franklin Betts , any ideas? (https://books.google.com/books?id=5I8LAAAAIAAJ)Naraht (talk) 01:37, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

@Naraht: Thanks for looking into it with me. I did find this letter from Thomas Jefferson to John Hopkins in 1813 asking to subscribe to the book (it was originally intended to be published serially and sent to subscribers in installments). When you search that website, you can find many other letters between John Hopkins and other figures like George Washington and Alexander Hamilton, dating as far back as 1786, which is before Johns Hopkins was born. So it seems all the more likely that Baltimore was home to an older John Hopkins and a younger Johns Hopkins at the same time in the 1810s. If you do find anything connecting Johns to this book, please bring it up here. Dugan Murphy (talk) 01:54, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Oh, and Franklin Betts is the publisher of the 1822 edition. That came out 3 years after the original 1819 publication by John Hopkins. Dugan Murphy (talk) 01:56, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

What it looks like to me is that the title page indicated the person that was subscribing. So instead of John Hopkins or Franklin Betts being the publisher, it appears the page was done differently for a subscriber John Hopkins and for subscriber Franklin Betts. In that regard, the "Publisher" was the Printer mentioned at the bottom of both, Thomas Murphy.Naraht (talk) 02:01, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

If that were the case, then the copy at Hathitrust and the copy on my shelf would have different people listed as the publisher. Both copies say "John Hopkins". Dugan Murphy (talk) 02:07, 10 January 2025 (UTC)