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Errors in the summary of the featured article

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Current DYK

• ... that of the 156 Conestoga wagons (pictured) brought to the Braddock Expedition of the French and Indian War, only one remained intact by the campaign's end? That's not what the article seems to say. "Only a few wagons of the Braddock Expedition ultimately remained, and they were returned to their original owners when the vehicles arrived at Wills Creek in Pennsylvania." and "In total, 156 wagons are thought to have been employed for the disastrous Braddock Expedition, the only wagon to survive intact being that of William Douglas." meaning that only one wagon survives until now, but multiple survived the expedition (or else they couldn't have been sent back to their owners surely). Fram (talk) 09:06, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

  Also, surely it should be 'employed by' or 'taken on' the expedition 'during' the war, not 'brought to ... of'. Modest Genius 13:17, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

  A rewording does not seem to be in the scope of Errors. The definition of "brought" is "take or go with (someone or something) to a place." which seems close enough to "taken on". SL93 (talk) 02:16, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

  Pinging nominator PrimalMustelid. SL93 (talk) 18:03, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Sorry, but that is not what the source says. It says (I quote):

The number of Pennsylvania wagons that arrived back at Wills Creek has not been definitely established. For the service of their wagons, 30 owners received payment for a period greater than the 51 days, but of these, only 10 were paid for services beyond what appears to be July 20. Only the wagon of William Douglas, out of 146 wagons involved, seems to have survived the campaign intact. Inasmuch as the other owners were reimbursed for loss of their wagons, it is likely that those few that arrived back at Fort Cumberland were so badly damaged as to render them unserviceable, and therefore not worth driving back to eastern Pennsylvania.

In short, the writer is talking about the situation at the end of the campaign, where only the one appears to have survived the campaign in serviceable condition, the others being too damaged to be worth retaining.

Please note that I am about to log off so will not be able to respond further today. Gatoclass (talk) 18:13, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

So am I expected to emend the hook and/or article, or has the situation resolved itself? PrimalMustelid (talk) 18:34, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Can someone please pull or correct this? What's the purpose of this page? Fram (talk) 09:44, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Per Gatoclass, my read is that several wagons were in some form you could vaguely still call a wagon, not completely smashed to bits but not usable, a la a totaled car. Only one was actually intact. That could very much be clarified in the article, but as long as there's not a hook–source disagreement, I'm not currently seeing a need to pull. If another admin disagrees, they're welcome to hit the button. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 10:03, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

There is no indication that the wagons which were returned to their owners where "not usable". Only of the "those few that arrived back at Fort Cumberland were so badly damaged as to render them unserviceable" do we know that they were so badly damaged, but it seems (from Gatoclass' pst) that there were only 10 kept in use after 10 July anyway, the others either already damaged or sent back to their owners. There is no indication, in the source nor in the article, that all 155 other wagons were not "intact". Fram (talk) 10:13, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not following your logic at all. The source plainly states that Only the wagon of William Douglas, out of 146 wagons involved, seems to have survived the campaign intact. If it's the only one to have survived intact, then none of the others made it back to their owners, otherwise they too would have "survived intact". Gatoclass (talk) 12:20, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Thank you for proving my point. You state "none of the others made it back to their owners", but the article states "Only a few wagons of the Braddock Expedition ultimately remained, and they were returned to their original owners when the vehicles arrived at Wills Creek in Pennsylvania. " Like I already said in my opening post. It can't both be true at the same time that "none of the others made it back to their owners" and "a few wagons were returned to their original owners". Fram (talk) 12:33, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Yes, the article contradicts itself by misstating the source. But that can be fixed simply by editing the article to comply with the source, there is no need to pull the hook. Gatoclass (talk) 12:48, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

If only someone had pointed out yesterday that the hook and the article contradict each other, e.g. by stating about the hook "That's not what the article seems to say." with the relevant quotes. What an utter waste of time is this page and some of its responders yet again. Fram (talk) 13:03, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

If only someone had the ability to improve an article... the fifth bullet point at the top of this page might prove instructive. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 13:07, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Fram, with respect, the point of your original post was hardly crystal clear. It appeared to me that you were claiming only one of the wagons is still extant today. If you'd simply said the article contradicts itself, there would have been no room for misinterpretation.

Regardless, I have now edited the article to conform with the sources. Gatoclass (talk) 13:23, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

With similar quantities of respect, looking at this for the first time now, the original report was crystal clear in describing the problem IMHO. The hook and the article said different things. That's a problem whichever way you look at it, and had I seen this yesterday I would have certainly replaced the hook and pushed it back to a later date. Better to err on the side of caution and give time for the issues to be ironed out. Also, the article now says 146 wagons but the hook still says 156. Which is correct? Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 13:38, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Not at all. On re-reading the original post, it still isn't at all clear that the poster is trying to point out a contradiction - or that a contradiction even exists, because wagons could have been "returned to their original owners" in a non-intact state. And if Fram was trying to simply point out a contradiction, what was the point of the statement meaning that only one wagon survives until now, but multiple survived the expedition (or else they couldn't have been sent back to their owners surely). That only confused the issue. So you may think the point was "crystal clear", but it seems every bit as confusing to me now as it did originally. Perhaps it only seems crystal clear to you because you had the benefit of this thread to clarify matters?

Regardless, thanks for pointing out the number error in the hook - fixed. Gatoclass (talk) 14:01, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

If quoting the hook and then stating "That's not what the article seems to say" immediately afterwards is not "trying to point out a contradiction"... Fram (talk) 14:17, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Well, every question raised here is an attempt to highlight a contradiction of some kind - the point I have tried to make is that the content of the contradiction you were attempting to highlight wasn't clear - at least to me. But there's no point dragging this out any further. There was a misunderstanding, these things happen, I suggest we just forget about it and perhaps resolve to do a little better next time. Gatoclass (talk) 14:43, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

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• 1991 – The Victoria Cross for Australia was instituted, making Australia first Commonwealth realm with a separate Victoria Cross award in its honours system. - pls add 'the' before "first". JennyOz (talk) 14:02, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

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(January 20)

"45 men have served in 46 presidencies". That's true now, but that text will still display on inauguration day. The extra presidency refers to President Grover Cleveland, but Trump is about to enter the same status. So the number of men won't change, but the number of presidencies will. Despite Martin Luther King day, 46 will be wrong after noon Eastern Time or 1700 UTC, January 20. Art LaPella (talk) 07:22, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

If someone remembers, this can be amended in real time on the day...  — Amakuru (talk) 07:26, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

OK. Art LaPella (talk) 07:34, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

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Usability and discoverability

I would expect the main page of the encyclopedia to prominently feature both a table of contents and a search feature. This page has a lot of trivia, which is a nice secondary function, but no longer seems to serve its primary functions very well. It does have a search feature, but it's a small icon up at the top in a bar of icons, rather than being front and center and already open with a box to type in words (in the style of a search engine, like ).

It's a bit weird we visibly link to Misplaced Pages:Contents/Portals, but the only link to Misplaced Pages:Contents (which is important enough it's linked to from every page on the site) is hidden behind the pancake menu icon in the upper left. We do have templates like Misplaced Pages:Contents/TOC navbar that could be used directly on this page as a better gateway to actual articles, for those that are curious but don't have any particular query in mind or are looking for inspiration. Beland (talk) 20:26, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Agree about the trivia, but remember opinions here come from the trivia writers. Last time I looked at portal usage statistics, it looks like a few people click to see what they are, and most of them don't click anything further. Art LaPella (talk) 03:55, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

This appears to be an objection to the WP:SKIN, not the contents of Main Page itself. The default skins on desktop and mobile both have a large search box or icon right at the top of every page. The desktop skin also has a link to Misplaced Pages:Contents in the menu shown on every single page. If you don't like the way that requires opening the menu before that link is visible, I suggest you bring it up on an appropriate talk page for the skin (perhaps Misplaced Pages talk:Vector 2022) or at the village pump. Modest Genius 14:09, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

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