Talk:Margaret Taylor/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Grnrchst (talk · contribs) 18:16, 3 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I'll take this on. Seems to be pretty tight already, so I'll suggest some changes section-by-section and then run through the check list.

"She was one of the few military wives [...]" Change "she" to "Margaret", as this is a new section, it needs to be made grammatically clear.
"she used her faith to endure the burdens [...]" This reads a bit weird to me. How does she use it to endure burdens?
- Spot-check: "Religion helped her through her ordeals of frontier living: she was an Episcopalian who maintained her faith and read Scripture throughout her life." So I'm not sure how to better clarify that from the source. :/
"Taylor held two slaves that accompanied her during farm work." Rephrase this, as "accompanied" makes it sound somewhat voluntary and not, you know, slavery.
- Spot-check: "To help her run it, she brought two slaves from Louisville, but she skimmed the milk and fed the chickens herself."

"She was able to live a domestic life [...]" Considering changing to "She was able to return to domestic life [...]"
"Taylor declined to accept" The use of "accept" is redundant, just "declined" is fine.
Detail about Taylor praying for her husband to lose the president election could be a good Did You Know hook.
"Despite her strong reservations, however, [...]" The "however" is redundant, as there's already a "despite".

"She managed the White House staff, which included 15 slaves. [...]"
- Spot-check: "During the Taylors' time in the White House, their staff consisted of white servants augmented by 15 of President Taylor's house slaves. By this time the issue of slavery had so divided the nation that the president preferred to keep these slaves out of sight, assigning them to the family quarters upstairs."

"buried by her husband" Changed to "buried beside her husband", as "by" can be read as in he was the one that buried her.

Detail about the portraits is another interesting potential DYK hook.
"a tinted sixth plate ambrotype portrait" Consider at least adding links for clarity and maybe cutting "sixth plate", as I have no idea what that's supposed to refer to.

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

It is reasonably well written.
a. (prose, spelling, and grammar):

There's some minor grammatical hiccups here and there (noted above), but otherwise good.

b. (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
It is factually accurate and verifiable.
a. (reference section):

The page ranges for some of the sources are quite wide, so consider using some narrower page ranges for citations.

b. (citations to reliable sources):

c. (OR):

Sources that I've spot-checked verify what they're cited to here.

d. (copyvio and plagiarism):
It is broad in its coverage.
a. (major aspects):

b. (focused):
It follows the neutral point of view policy.
Fair representation without bias:

There's a couple words that imply something non-neutral way (noted above), but those are easily taken care of.
It is stable.
No edit wars, etc.:
It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
a. (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):

Both images used are in the public domain.

b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):

The images currently don't have alt text, please write some.
Overall:
Pass/fail:

Overall, really good stuff that easily passes. My only notes are ones that should be relatively easy to resolve, as they're mostly about small grammatical, wording or formatting issues. Resolve those and I'll pass this. --Grnrchst (talk) 18:16, 3 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

(Criteria marked are unassessed)