Talk:Percy Sledge

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A news item involving Percy Sledge was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the In the news section on 14 April 2015.

Wikipedia

American or US-American

Someone changed the wikilink "United States|US-American" to "United States|American" which I have reverted. This someone should be aware of the fact that "American" means "part of the continent America" which is not identical with the "United States". As long as there are no "United States of the complete continent of America", internationally the term "US-American" (and not "American") is used for anything applying to the USA. -- Meister 21:51, 16 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agree That's a constant problem which US citizens/residents don't recognize. The official name of the country is United States of America, not "United States" or "America". There is a "United States of Mexico" and "United States of Brazil," so even the term "U.S." is somewhat a problem. Safer to use "USA" and the somwhat awkward, but more accurate wikilink "United States|US-American". --TGC55 13:54, 21 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And yet…the officially named "United States of Mexico" is generally referred to as "Mexico," its citizens as "Mexicans,"the "United States of Brazil" as "Brazil," citizens as "Brazilians," the "United States of Venezuela" as "Venezuela," citizens as "Venezuelans," etc. Unless there are nations competing for the national name, like "The Democratic Republic of ____" vs "The People's Republic of ____," the political organization of most countries is omitted in their commonly used names. It's not unusual to confuse nomenclature with characteristics: If the USA were named "Freedonia", its history and citizens' attitudes would be no different.Jackaroodave (talk) 12:08, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Still, even Mexicans refer to America as the Estados Unidos and when Middle Eastern terrorists chant "Death to America", they are not imagining Canada. Srnec 03:28, 24 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, that's funny that even Middle East terrorists have been picking up genuine US-terminology :-) -- Meister 11:57, 24 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Your disdain of Americans is obvious. Answer me this: if someone went to France, China, Australia, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Chile, Finland, or Libya, and said, "HI! I'M AN AMERICAN!" Do you think they would say "Now hold on there, friend... are you a UNITED STATES CITIZEN?"

...in the future, try not to be so retarded. And no, I'm not an American, so don't try that one, either. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.182.179.169 (talk) 09:04, 13 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Date of birth

Here is some reasonable evidence to support 25 November 1940 (not 1941), as his birth date. [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7]. Anyone care to comment ?

Derek R Bullamore 20:45, 31 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Percy Sledge performed at the "Christmas Under the Oaks" festival at Heritage Square in Sulphur, Louisiana on December 03, 2011. This was reported in the Southwest Daily News, December 07, 2011, by Susan LaFargue Kyle staff writer for the paper. In an interview some biography was listed including his being born November 25,1940, his wife's name being Rose, that he has 12 children and 14 grandchildren, and that in 1989 Sledge received the Rhythm and Blues Foundation’s first Career Achievement Award (here).

His date of birth is, and apparently has been questioned, and is not referenced in the article. Here is a look at references:

1940:

Louisiana Music Hall of Fame, page with birth, already used as a reference but also includes a DOB.
Sulphur, Louisiana daily news paper, and website, with date of birth.
Current Rock & Roll Hall of Fame info = 1940 [8] Thisdaytrivia (talk) 04:25, 25 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

1941:

IMDb; that is not a reference but an external link, lists 1941.
Discog; discog.com, not a reference but an external link, lists 1941
Last.fm lists 1941 but is also not an acceptable reference as it is user edited.

No date of birth:

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; biography of Percy Sledge here
All music; biography (not a reference) lists no date.

The dilemma is that a birth date is used on Wikipedia that has been questioned (over 5 years ago) and there was no comment nor correction.

Unless there is evidence to the contrary, or acceptable references for support, the year of birth has to be changed. This may not set well with some but the policies and guidelines are clear on content and references and are more stringent concerning a biography of a living person. If verifiable references are wrong that would be their issue but continually listing a wrong date, on a BLP, with no source or reference, is against policy.

Here is some interesting information: Amazon.com lists a biography, attributes the information to; The community biography appearing in this box is provided by SoundUnwound, which attributes the text to Wikipedia: here. yet the date of birth is actually listed as November 25, 1940 here. We have a source, that is not an acceptable reference, that lists information being credited to this site, but the date does not match. Go figure right!!

I have marked some dead links that need to be deleted but thought I would comment before effecting a change. Otr500 (talk) 05:42, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I changed the birth year to 1940 (after correcting the mistake) to reflect the year per verifiable references. Otr500 (talk) 22:44, 12 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The date was changed to 1941 on 31 May 2012‎ by 2.3.184.63 without comments. From the discussion above, it seems better to put it back to 1940. --Rene1596 (talk) 12:43, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

He is not dead you dummy!

Percy is still touring. Do a google news search. Go to the "Official Percy Sledge" site and book tickets to concerts.

Here is part of a recent article:

"Cajun Hot Sauce Festival set for April 13-15 Monday, March 26, 2007 1:32 PM CDT By Steve Bandy The Daily Iberian

National recording artists Billy Currington and Percy Sledge will headline two nights of concerts for the seventh annual Cajun Hot Sauce Festival April 13 -15 at SugArena."

72.147.42.94 22:14, 30 March 2007 (UTC)H.E. Hall[reply]

Quite right - factually. So I have removed the erroneous "year of death" from the article, which you as an editor could have done without being uncivil on this talk page. The heading to this post is not recommended as a means of approaching one user on his talk page, let alone who knows how many users visiting this article. Thanks. Refsworldlee^(chew-fat)(eds) 22:21, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 00:29, 28 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Citations & References

See Wikipedia:Footnotes for an explanation of how to generate footnotes using the <ref(erences/)> tags Nhl4hamilton (talk) 06:11, 3 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Categories at the bottom of the article

I deleted three of the "categories" because they were redundant. For example, with him in the Cat: for African American male singers, and another category of "American male singers" (which is not as specific) but both had been added there-- practically the same thing, and the reason why I deleted it. I also dropped two categories for the same reasons. Leaving one important factor out while covering the same aspects too broadly should be avoided if possible, right? --Leahtwosaints (talk) 00:46, 12 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Nurse or Orderly

Most references indicate that he worked as a hospital orderly, although the BBC obituary mentions him working as a nurse. Since there is no mention of him obtaining a nursing education or degree, I suspect that the reference to him being a nurse is mistaken. Does anyone have specific information? Kurtreedk (talk) 17:28, 14 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Children

He had 12 children, all between his marriages

Does that mean that he had no children to either of his wives, and all 12 children he did have were born after he divorced wife No. 1 and before he married wife no. 2? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:02, 14 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

No, and no. The source - though not very well written - is saying that he had 12 children in all, some of whom were with his first wife and the rest with his second wife. "Rosa Sledge is his second wife. Between the two women, Sledge has 12 children..." I've clarified the article a little. Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:16, 14 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I sorta doubted that's the way it was, although that was the primary interpretation of the words as they were written. Amazingly flexible language, English. A good example of how "between" can be read either inclusively or exclusively. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:34, 14 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Date of birth?

The New York Times has been reporting the year of birth for Percy Sledge as 1940; Billboard and others report 1941. Not sure which is correct. Famspear (talk) 03:36, 15 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Official public records (like this - subscription-only, but other sources are available) unequivocally state November 25, 1940. It may be that confusion arose because, being born late in the year, he was 25 when "WAMLAW" became a hit, and someone somewhere then interpreted his birth year as 1941. But, we should give the correct 1940 date here. PS: This has already been discussed and resolved in a thread higher up this page. Ghmyrtle (talk) 07:38, 15 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I tend to give a bit more weight to the New York Times on issues like this, and they give 1940 as well. Connormah (talk) 13:05, 15 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Ghmyrtle! I'm a short guy, so it's hard for me to see the prior thread high up on the talk page..... ...............ummm that's a joke! I need to pay closer attention!

On another topic, Percy did have a federal tax conviction back in the 1990s. I will see what I can find on that.

I never met him, but I talked with him by phone for a radio broadcast interview back in the 1970s (I was a top 40 radio disc jockey back then). Famspear (talk) 15:13, 15 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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