 | This page in a nutshell: This user writes articles few people read. |
Greetings!
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I first contributed to Wikipedia as a registered user in September 2004. (It's cute that I signed my first article, which is a reminder to be kind to newbies.) I did my small part on a relatively narrow range of topics, usually having to do with the American Revolution and the history of the Ohio Country. Wikipedia in those early days was the Wild West. On a whim in 2005 I created the "quote box" template, which is now used in three-quarters of a million articles. That should probably get mentioned in my obituary. More substantively, I worked with others to improve the referencing requirements for featured articles. Back in those olden days, I caught the featured article bug and created some of my best work:
Daniel Boone- Featured status September 25, 2006, made it to the Main Page on January 26, 2008. To the best of my knowledge, this was the first featured article about a participant in the American Revolutionary War. I revised the article in December 2020 to bring it back up to featured standards.
- Crawford expedition
- Winner of Danny's third contest on November 9, 2006 (a wonderfully unexpected honor), featured status November 26, 2006, finally reached the Main Page on May 25, 2019. To the best of my knowledge, this was the first featured article about an event in the American Revolutionary War. Apparently, no other Revolutionary War article had even been rated "A class". Crawford's Defeat was once fairly well known, but I don't think it gets mentioned in history classes anymore.
- Lochry's Defeat
- "Did you know?" entry for December 7, 2006, promoted to featured on April 21, 2007. A battle so little-known your history professor has probably never heard of it. There are some Revolutionary War battles even more obscure, but I'm not sure if there's enough secondary material to raise them to featured status. Might be interesting sometime to see just how obscure a battle could be and still become featured. Graced the Main Page on May 2, 2014.
- Pontiac's War
- Featured on May 7, 2007, after 2.5 years in the making. This appears to be the first featured article about an American Indian war. A few more reviews like this, and Mom might invite me to family reunions again. Had its day on the Main Page on May 9, 2009.
I stopped writing featured articles after that, but I enjoyed bringing the odd article up to snuff. My highlight reel includes the Illinois campaign, the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence, the United States Declaration of Independence, the Townshend Acts, list of delegates to the Continental Congress, John Hancock, Samuel Adams, Madame Montour, Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet, Molly Brant, the Winnebago War 
, and the Whiskey Rebellion.
After not contributing much for a decade or so, in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I returned to work on more articles, including:
- Tecumseh
- Featured status on May 22, 2021, graced the Main Page on October 5, 2021, the anniversary of Tecumseh's death, getting 62,454 views, which appears to be above average.
John Lewis (Shawnee leader)- Appeared as the lead "Did you know?" entry on the Main Page on October 22, 2021, though it got only 5,421 views, on the low side for an entry with a picture. I need hookier hooks to get people to click on articles about obscure Native Americans.
- Kekewepelethy
- Appeared in "Did you know?" on November 26, 2021, getting only 2,474 views. I hoped mentioning Daniel Boone in the hook would draw more eyeballs, but the hook also revealed the subject was Shawnee, which was probably a mistake.
- Snake (Shawnee leader)
- Also appeared in "Did you know?" on November 26, 2021, getting 4,896 views. I used an ambiguous hook, not mentioning "Native American" or "Shawnee," hoping that would attract more clicks, which seemed to work when compared with Kekewepelethy.