Talk:Doc Blanchard

Mil hist tag

This article has been tagged for the military history project, however, I do not believe that this is correct. The article is focused almost entirely on this subject's football career. The subject may have been in the military, but the article mentions very little about his service career and it seems that his notability comes from being a football player, not his military service. As such I believe that the mil history tag should be removed. Does anyone else agree or disagree? If it is to stay linked to the military history project the article should be greatly expanded to discuss his military career in much more detail. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:15, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Considering he is one of the most famous players in U.S. college football history, and did so while playing for the Army Black Knights at the United States Military Academy West Point leading Army to 3 national football championships in a row - all in conjunction with serving in the military as a fighter pilot and retired a Colonel - I certainly believe he's within the project's scope. Perhaps you should raise this on the project's talk page and get feed back there. - ℅ ✰ALLST☆R✰ ^echo 05:54, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

I'll post a notice at the project regarding this issue so that the project members can join in this discussion and give guidance. - ℅ ✰ALLST☆R✰ ^echo 05:58, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Seems reasonable to have him within Milhist scope to me. His involvement with the military was more than incidental.  Roger Davies ^talk 06:28, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, clearly the subject had a long military career but my point is that the focus of the article is not military at all. There is one sentence devoted to his military service and nothing to suggest that he performed anything of note. If it weren't for his football career, would he not qualify as a non-notable person and therefore not qualify for a biography on wikipedia at all? If I clicked on the article expecting an outline of the subject's military career I would be sorely disappointed. Are we supposed to include the biography of every person who achieves notability for non military aspects of their life just because they previously served? Thus, should we include Don Bradman in the military history project because he served during World War II? If we were to do that a lot of people with thoroughly non-notable military careers would then qualify for a military history tag. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:55, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Did Don Bradman graduate from a military educational institution and become a legend there? No, but Doc Blanchard did. Anyway, apparently we crossed paths (you posting here while I was still editing the article). Check out the article now. I have expanded on his military service. - ℅ ✰ALLST☆R✰ ^echo 08:46, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Be Bold this is a start class article - By having the Military service section it will encourage editors to contribute to it. If the section was not there would anyone bother ? I also believe its in scope for WP;MILHIST --Jim Sweeney (talk) 10:52, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, his number has been retired at West Point... so it seems reasonable for MILHIST... 76.66.196.218 (talk) 11:26, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, concensus seems to be against me on this, so it is probably time for me to retire gracefully. The expanded military career additions are a good start, and as Jim said above, leaving the Mil Hist tag on probably encourages work on the article. Good luck with the GA review, by the way. AustralianRupert (talk) 01:25, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Doc Blanchard/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Hi, I'll be doing the good article review for the article over the next couple of days. If there are any questions, feel free to comment here as I've added this page to my watchlist. Alternately, you can leave a message on my talk page. Strikehold (talk) 22:55, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Good deal. This is my first GA nomination so I'm not ashamed to say I'm not too familiar with the process. I'll do what I can. - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 00:38, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

It's a straightforward process. Anyway, I've posted my comments below. You can reply beneath each one to let me know if you make a change based on them or if you disagree. All in all, the article looks pretty good, most of the comments are fairly minor things. Strikehold (talk) 01:35, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I made some tweaks to the article, mostly things like combining some related lines into paragraphs. Take a look at my edits, and change as you feel necessary. Anyway, I think the article looks really good and meets the Good Article criteria. You did a great job on it, it's definitely a nice tribute for quite an interesting guy. Strikehold (talk) 00:59, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Looks good to me and thanks for the suggestions and help. - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 01:13, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

General

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 01:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• I think a portrait for the infobox would be good. Here is one option. That photo is public domain since it is the work of the U.S. Army (credited to Army Athletic Communications).

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:43, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• Per WP:Paragraph: "One-sentence paragraphs are unusually emphatic, and should be used sparingly." Since I do not believe emphasis is the intent here, some of these one liners could probably be combined into paragraphs. In my opinion, that'd give a more streamlined appearance.

Lead

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 02:50, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• The lead is a little on the short side in my opinion. I would recommend expanding it a few sentences, with the goal of summarizing the rest of the article.

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:43, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• I would also recommend moving the last sentence of the lead to the main text.

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:43, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• It says he is known for playing at West Point, but does not explain what this is to an unfamiliar reader. I recommend also working it in somewhere that, in an athletics context, the teams are referred to simply as "Army". Doesn't have to be in the lead, but should be before or coincide with the first use of the term.

Army athletics section

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• I recommend splitting off the first two paragraphs to an "Early years" or "Early life" section, as they address his life before he arrived at the USMA. I'd also rename the "Army athletics" section to something more general like "West Point career" or "College career". For the early life section, I would start off with the part about his father and include where and when Blanchard was born (information in the infobox).

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• Blanchard was also recruited by Fordham, worth a mention since they were also a powerhouse at the time.^[1]

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• Also worth a mention he played football at UNC on the freshman team (at the time, freshman were not yet allowed to play varsity football). An ESPN article says he attended there because his mother's cousin, Jim Tatum, was the head coach.^[2]

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• "During his three years at West Point..." I don't think this is correct. Since he graduated from West Point, I'm pretty sure he had to spend four years there (even though he transferred, all cadets have to spend four years there). The ESPN article said: "He sat out the 1943 season and then joined Davis at Army in 1944."^[3]

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• "..the tie being a legendary 0-0 game against Notre Dame..." I agree it was a legendary game, but think the term is subjective. One suggestion would be to say it was called "legendary" by XYZ or that it was called the "Game of the Century". The ESPN article is a reference for the latter term.

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• I like the first use of {{cquote}}, but the other three, being only one-line quotes, I think can be incorporated directly into the paragraphs. In my opinion, it would give a neater appearance and make the text flow easier.

 Done

• Per WP:ENDASH, things like team win/loss records and game scores should use ndashes (– or –) instead of hyphens (-). I went ahead and changed these.

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• Where you're talking about Blanchard being "Mr. Inside", it is probably worth mentioning Davis was nicknamed "Mr. Outside".

 Done

• Per WP:MOS, full-length feature films should be italicized. I went ahead and changed this.

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 03:32, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• "Blanchard coached Army’s freshman team in the 1950s, but he never played professional football, choosing an Air Force career instead.[5]" I think this should be after the part about him also running track. I also think the second part, about never playing pro football, should go into the next section. The second line in the "Military career" section touches on the same thing.

Honors and memorials section

 Done - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 01:55, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

• Think this section should come after the "Death" section.

Copyright problem removed

One or more portions of this article duplicated other source(s). Various sentences had been pasted in this article verbatim from: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/sports/ncaafootball/21blanchard.html http://www.thestate.com/scathletes/story/620947.html and other sources. Infringing material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a license compatible with GFDL. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 18:15, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

"Little Doc"

Though his father was not a physician, it seems Doc Kuhn too was first called "Little Doc." It is not often one sees a "Felix Anthony." Do we know whence came Blanchard's ancestors? Cake (talk) 18:13, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Doc Blanchard/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

==Initial rating== I rated this article as "start class." It provides more useful information than a mere stub should, including the chart and some ref. material. Though it needs more citations and should be expanded, the information provided is a good start.--Evb-wiki 03:31, 14 January 2007 (UTC) ==Mississippi and Military History projects== I added these 2. Mississippi because he played his high school football at Saint Stanislaus College prep school in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Military History because he played his college football at West Point. - ℅ ✰ALLST☆R✰ echo 20:24, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Last edited at 22:31, 18 May 2009 (UTC). Substituted at 13:33, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

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