Talk:Daniel Bell (freedman)

Article is a replication of original research

The content of this article should be edited to a large degree. As is evident by the citations, the article in its entirety has been taken from the original research published here: https://earlywashingtondc.org/stories/emancipating_bells. Even the additional citations were merely pulled from the footnotes of the linked article. It seems bad form for a Wikipedia article to just be a rephrasing of every detail of one person's published work.

Kaci Lee (talk) 15:50, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

I did not use footnotes from the Nash article as my sources. I researched. I researched and researched until I could not find anything anymore. There's only so much info about the Bells. Anything that may look that way is a misunderstanding / jumping to conclusions about how I work.–CaroleHenson (talk) 01:17, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

• CaroleHenson – My main issue with the article is that it appears to be a complete paraphrasing of an article published elsewhere. As the author of the original research, I feel as if my work is being infringed upon, true copyright issues or not. I do not appreciate having years of historical research being regurgitated here in such a complete form. I am very aware that there is little information about the Bell Family available (it's why I spent the time researching and writing about them), but that does not excuse copying my research and presenting it here to such a large degree. There is a way to create a biographical entry without resorting to the reproduction of someone else's work. – Kaci Lee (talk) 17:25, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Kaci Lee, what do you think needs to be done?–CaroleHenson (talk) 17:40, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

In the short run, I am thinning the article of tangental information, like the long note about Daniel's sisters... and putting some info into notes. I'll go through the article and see what else I can do.

For what it's worth, I really appreciate all the research that you completed and am thankful for it. I am also thankful that you are here to ensure that the article is correct. Where I find differences in sources, I generally make note of that one way or another in the article. It sounds like the issues may be resolved now, but if not, I am happy to do what I can to be clearer or more accurate.–CaroleHenson (talk) 18:01, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Kaci Lee I am confused.

• I don't understand your point about original research. If you are saying the source conducted "original research", I agree with that. Not sure why it needs to be said. It's using a phrase that means something very different for us as Wikipedia editors.
• Yes, a lot of the content came from Emancipating Bells]. I did a LOT and then even a LOT more research. I worked with what I could find. I think part of the issue is that there weren't a lot of contemporary sources for the information, so that even the many of the other sources that I used probably used that as well.
• I am trying to sort out what specifically you think needs to be done. There were eleven sources used for the article. I think you have the wrong maintenance tag - since the remedy for "single source" is to get more sources. There are 11 sources.
• I ran the copy vio report and will look to see if there are ways that I can reword some phrases. I think that's more of what the issue is.–CaroleHenson (talk) 23:09, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

I changed the maintenance tag to {{cleanup}} - {{Single source}} is not accurate. I added the in use tag and will use the copy vio report to change wording where I can.–CaroleHenson (talk) 23:14, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

Things that have shown up on the copyvio report that I cannot change are: "District of Columbia", "deed of manumission", "2nd Mississippi Infantry (African Descent)", and a few cases where there's only so many ways to phrase something, like "died between 1870 and 1875". What fixes some things for emancipating bells will create a problem with another source.

I have to go back through your edits. I think that you are editing the content as if ALL the information came from emancipating Bells but that's not true. It also looks as if you reworded in a couple places that created items on the copyvio report.–CaroleHenson (talk) 23:48, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

I think I got most of the issues - missing citation, making changes based upon the copyvio report, identifying where I made spelling, etc. mistakes, and sorting out why you may have made some changes that you did. I clarified some things in the article. Here's the comparison of the article from just before your edits to my final edit right now [1].

I am about done for tonight, but it seems that the places where I still don't understand your edits were where the info came from Pacheco. Did you look at the Pacheco source? In any event, I will come look at this some more in the morning. My head is scrambled.–CaroleHenson (talk) 01:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

• CaroleHenson I have not looked at the Pacheco text for a number of years, so I do not recall where her information regarding the number of Bell children came from, but I do know from my own research that it is incorrect. The number of children Daniel and Mary had was 8. —Kaci Lee (talk) 17:24, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Kaci Lee Yes, I sorted that out. When Pacheco says that there are 12 family members, I believe that included Mary, Daniel, 8 children and 2 grandchildren.–CaroleHenson (talk) 17:38, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

I went back and reread the Nash source article and the works seem very different to me. Nash is a lovely story that sets a scene and then rolls from one thing to the next, but not necessarily in chronological order. This Wikipedia article breaks facts into groupings and does not flow like the Nash article at all. It is chunked out into information that is relatively chronological. In some cases there was more detail in Nash that did not make it into the Wikipedia article... and conversely there is some information that is in the article that is not in the Nash article. There are a limited set of core facts and the facts are generally the same. The facts should generally be the same, right? You thank you for catching mistakes that I made. And, I just have a just a couple more things to cross-check that I think are Nash vs. Pacheco differences. All that said, I think the article is definitely better now.–CaroleHenson (talk) 05:24, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

 Done - final diff of your and my changes.–CaroleHenson (talk) 06:37, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Double-checking

Kaci Lee I have really heard you about how much distress you are in that I was able to use so many facts from your page. I am going to go through the other sources and change the tags in the article where the info is in other sources... so that the only Nash tags that are left are for information that is uniquely your research.

Then, I can better sort out additional info that is not really necessary... and post a question on Teahouse to see if there are thoughts about whether more information (like a lot of detail about Bell's sisters that I removed) that can / should be removed.–CaroleHenson (talk) 22:42, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

I finished a good stab at this, although I think Pacheco could be used in some places, but would need to be edited to remove some of the detail that came from you. I posted a message on Teahouse: WP:Teahouse#Question raised by a source's author - Daniel Bell (freedman)–CaroleHenson (talk) 03:22, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

If noone replies to this, I will consider a non-issue - or no longer an issue.–CaroleHenson (talk) 04:24, 23 April 2021 (UTC)