Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Netta Ivory

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Although numbers are similar on both sides, the keep arguments get less weight because we have "keep because she is notable", a misunderstanding of the mainly British usage of Hon Sec in a society, and zero weight for "keep because such and such a person created the article". Late calls to merge/redirect don't have much support, but as usual, anyone can request a WP:REFUND without reference to me if they propose to merge what little content is there. Stifle (talk) 14:58, 14 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Netta Ivory

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Netta Ivory (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Fails WP:GNG. Clarityfiend (talk) 08:52, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  • This is not exactly accurate - as best I could piece it together, in 1902 she co-founded the Scotland branch of the English organization, based in Edinburgh. In about 1905, she and her sister engineered the founding of a satelite Scottish branch in Aberdeen, and then in 1911, they reconfigured the Scottish branches into a new Scottish Society, still affiliated with the English organization but now within its own national structure, with the Edinburgh (formerly Scotland) branch leadership apparently becoming the overall national leadership. This is what eventually became the fully-independent OneKind, which chooses to trace its history to the 1911 reconfiguration engineered by the Ivorys. Thus, in a very real sense, she did 'co-found the organization' if one means OneKind. I still don't think that is enough to make her notable (founding what would eventually become a notable non-profit is not itself an independent notability-confering act, in my opinion), but what she did was more consequential than 'just founding a branch'. Agricolae (talk) 01:38, 8 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: I think she is notable as per WP:Notability, but still a weak keep is what I suggest. ItcouldbepossibleTalk 15:38, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Leaning keep. Subject was respected enough in her field to be named honorary secretary of the organization in her eighties. BD2412 T 16:29, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • That's obscene, how many tens of thousands of organizations are there that recognize their own members in all sorts of ways? That's not how notability is determined on Wikipedia. The source [1] is the barest possible passing mention. OneKind has has many leaders and honorees in its history, and they can be discussed in that article. Reywas92Talk 17:39, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • This is not an honor - in calling her 'honorary secretary' it is just reflecting that her role as secretary is not a formal one (for example, it is not a defined role in the society's charter). Agricolae (talk) 19:37, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
      • No, "Honorary" just means "unpaid", ie a voluntary post, with no implication of it not being a formal post in the organisation's constitution. It distinguishes a volunteer, one of the leaders of the organisation, from a paid employee in the organisation's office. PamD 08:30, 8 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: urging some caution on the delete front: I can find more passing mention for her in historical newspapers than I've been able to find for many people from a similar time frame who have been saved at AfD by people with better historical newspaper-fu than me, so I strongly suspect there is more about her than I've been able to turn up. Also, her unmarried name is Ivory - I have no idea if she married or not, but if she did, she will almost certainly have changed her last name, complicating the search. I found several passing mentions in The Gentlewoman and Modern Life, enough to suggest to me that she would be notable by present-day standards, and she frequently turns up in hits in The Scotsman in the 1930s. -- asilvering (talk) 18:19, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    Of course, after I say that I turn up a classified ad put out by her sister after her death that confirms that she did not change her name and probably did not marry; I've clarified her name in the article. Maybe someone else can do more. -- asilvering (talk) 18:26, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    Most of the examples I am seeing are just the same single press release repeated in multiple papers. Agricolae (talk) 19:37, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    That's my memory of the Scotsman coverage I found, but not the Gentlewoman and Modern Life stuff. But the latter is certainly not enough for a keep vote. To rephrase my point: I'm certain there are more sources I haven't found, but I'm not certain those sources would push her into a WP:GNG pass. With the sources we have so far she doesn't even look borderline. -- asilvering (talk) 21:16, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. While others may argue about WP notability guidelines, I see that SlimVirgin created the article. That's sufficient validation for me. – S. Rich (talk) 18:23, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    This is among the most worthless arguments I've ever seen at AFD. SlimVirgin wrote many admirable articles, but other creations I see lacking in notability include Nicolas Atwood (which could be merged with his website Bite Back), Claire Starozinski (sourced to a self-published book on bullfighting; could be merged with her organization Anti-Corrida Alliance), David Leppard, Jack Fischel (a basic resume, unclear if he meets WP:NPROF), André Tylee, Susan Finsen, Alexis Shotwell, Stanisław Kłodziński, Paul Lawrence Rose (zero independent sources), Gerry Mackie (just one independent source, a book review), and Angus Taylor (philosopher) (zero independent sources, no claim to pass NPROF). Not saying I'd AFD all these, but I'm sure the closing admin is smart enough to disregard a vote that does not bother to address the article itself. Reywas92Talk 20:24, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I'll admit I was floored by that comment too. The reason why most others focus on WP notability guidelines is because that is the deciding factor, not because you like someone who wrote the article. KoA (talk) 02:30, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete 'Hon. Sec. of the Scottish Anti-Vivisection Society' is not a "well-known and significant award or honor" (WP:BIO) - it was a position that she seems to have occupied from the time the group was founded - in 1905 she was hon. secretary, her sister was hon. treasurer. Though the article makes it sound like a local branch officer was honored by the national organization, there is no distinction between the two - she was Hon. Sec. of the Scottish branch (located in Edinburgh), one of 38 Branches of the England-based society, and continued in that role when the Scottish branch became the semi-autonomous Scottish Society under the same leadership. And no, being secretary of such a society is insufficient, in and of itself, for notability. None of the sources give her more than passing mention: 1. is non-WP:RS and entirely non-selective (being dead is the sole criteria for inclusion); 2: simply has a one-sentence reference to the society that names her and Coleridge as founders (she isn't even subject of the sentence); 3. is reporting on a press release that she put out, and at the end mirrors her typical signature, 'Netta Ivory, Hon. Sec.', by stating that she is honorary secretary; 4. is basically the newsletter of the England-based organization reporting that she attended their national meeting, placing her in societal context as daughter of Lord Ivory, and telling us that she "favoured Brown with a white hat". Further searches turn up nothing both independent of the society and more substantial than a single sentence that she was a co-founder. That is not notability, not even close, no matter who created the page. Agricolae (talk) 19:33, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. I've been poking around on this one for a bit without commenting so far, but Agricolae summed it up better that I could. She only has two claims in the article: 1. Co-founder of a local branch society in Edinburgh, 2. getting the honorary secretary recognition. Neither really rise to any particular BLP notability. Stubs usually have key claims to fame that stick more than those, and as Agricolae mentioned, the other mentions are also just passing mention. KoA (talk) 02:36, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • At the risk of beating a dead horse: "getting the honorary secretary recognition" (emphasis added). Anyone who has been a member of a small organization knows that someone can be placed on a slate of officers, even for many years, for all kinds of reasons - they are good at that particular administrative skill/it is similar to what they do in professional life; not good at it, but everyone too polite/willing to 'go along to get along' to try to replace them; nobody else is willing to take it on; sheer inertia - let's just reappoint whoever has it now; cliques; etc. No notability-conferring 'recognition' can be implied from the fact that she held such a position. Agricolae (talk) 15:10, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, it should be clear from what I'm mentioning, but I'll also making it doubly clear just in case that I agree with you that this isn't wiki-notability recognition, but more of a passing mention recognition. A title like that generally amounts to WP:PUFFERY if anyone actually tries to use it. KoA (talk) 21:29, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Peterkingiron, I'm not sure how the size of the organization affects her notability - can you explain your thinking? Also, do you think her role should or should not be added to the organization page? Thanks. Lamona (talk) 20:35, 13 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
My own opinion on this: If we go by WP:GNG, only independent coverage matters. However, there are all of those guidelines based on who 'can be presumed to be notable', to which RfD participants often add their own rules of thumb. Here we have seen argued that 'being named hon. sec. of a national-level organization makes her notable', but if that type of argument is to carry any weight at all, it must take into account the difference between being secretay of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society versus the Scottish Society for the Growing of Unusually-Shaped Vegetables. Size really does matter if one is making this kind of argument for notability. As to her incusion in the OneKind article, their page does include her in two of about 50 entries in their timeline, the first for the 1911 founding simply referring to 'the Ivory sisters', and the second reporting her death in 1949, but she is in no sense featured in their history to the level where it would be proportional to mention - plus we generally determine whether something is noteworthy based on coverage from outside the organization rather than their inherently-biased view, and there doesn't seem to be anyone outside the organization who cares (the only source we have isn't even talking about the same 'foundation', focussing on the founding of the Scottish branch rather than the subsequent founding fo the Scottish Society claimed as origin by the organization). And as if that wasn't enough to be getting on with, our OneKind article currently credits the Duchess of Hamilton with being the founder, apparently based on a BBC interview with her daughter-in-law. Agricolae (talk) 01:31, 14 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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