Template:Did you know nominations/Disappearance of Gary Mathias

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The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:23, 24 February 2018 (UTC)

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Disappearance of Gary Mathias[edit]

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  • ... that one of the four men who disappeared along with Gary Mathias 40 years ago today was later found in a trailer where he had starved to death despite an abundant food supply? Source:The Washington Post; July 6, 1978; "5 'Boys' Who Never Came Back "More than a dozen C-ration cans from an outside storage shed had been opened and emptied - one had been opened with an Army P38 can opener, which only Madruga and Mathias who had served in the Army, probably knew how to use - but no one had opened a locker in the same shed containing enough dehydrated Mexican dinners and fruit cocktails and assorted other meals to keep all five alive for a year."
    • ALT1:... that 40 years ago today, Gary Mathias and four other men inexplicably abandoned a working automobile to walk down a dirt road high in California's Plumas National Forest, without winter clothing or food? Source: Same article as above hook "The car was 70 miles from Chico, on a deserted and rut-ravaged mountain road. It had stopped at the snow line, and although its tires had apparently spun, the car was not really stuck; five men easily could have pushed it free. The gas tank was a quarter full. Four maps, including one of California, lay neatly folded in the glove compartment. The keys were gone, but when police hot-wired the car the engine started immediately"

Created by Daniel Case (talk). Self-nominated at 19:07, 21 February 2018 (UTC).

  • Okay, so this is new enough, long enough, doesn't contain any obvious copyright violations. The fair use rationale on the image is a little cloudy over its author etc, but its extremely poor quality and unlikely to set any FUR alarm bells ringing. The hooks, well clearly for me the first hook is more engaging but it's not directly about the article, which is the called the "disappearance of Gary Mathias", its focus is on another individual entirely. The second hook is better in that regard, although the use of "inexplicably abandoned" is a bit wide of the mark for me, and not 100% aligned with the source which just says that in the opinion of one person they could have recovered the vehicle. I suggest just removing "inexplicably" (because also, they're all dead or missing so "inexplicable" is somewhat innate), but I would also enhance that hook to reflect the result of these individuals' decisions, because right now that hook is a bit meh. At the very least it needs to cover the idea that Mathias is missing, as that's the target article's subject matter. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:43, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  • "... that 40 years ago today, Gary Mathias disappeared after abandoning a working automobile to walk into California's Plumas National Forest without winter clothing or food, along with four other men who were all found dead?" could be a starting suggestion so it focuses on the article subject, and contains the pertinent points of the event in the hook? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:02, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  • The QPQ was inadequate, including approving a problematic hook; this needs to be addressed before the nomination here can be approved. Also, ALT1 at 203 characters is too long and has been struck; The Rambling Man's starting suggestion above would need to be trimmed, as it's currently 219 characters. BlueMoonset (talk) 20:11, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Yeah, I think once we get to a handful of characters, we need to re-assess what's really important here. Plus, I hadn't finished the review, the QPQ analysis is still outstanding, please step back and allow me to do what I offered to do, or else do it yourself. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:32, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Please do proceed; I thought you had finished the review, and as I had previously posted to the other template before you started the review here, I thought I should mention the issues found there. BlueMoonset (talk) 20:39, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Thanks very much. Let's get the hook and the basics right, then worry about the peripheral nonsense mandated by the arcane DYK process. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:42, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
ALT3: ... that 40 years ago today, Gary Mathias disappeared leaving a working automobile, to walk into California's Plumas National Forest without winter clothing or food, along with four men later found dead?
This comes in at 198 characters by my count. Daniel Case (talk) 05:06, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
I've added a comma after "automobile" because our more pedantic grammartarians would say you're suggesting the car walked into the forest..., otherwise I approve this hook. The Rambling Man (talk) 08:26, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
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