Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Barney Dallenbach

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus, defaulting to keep. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 02:57, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Robert Barney Dallenbach[edit]

While the Pillar of Fire Church may or may not be notable (it gets only 530 Google hits), there's no need for these auxilliary pages about its employees and their children to exist. Notability not established, fails Google test (Mr. Dallenbach gets almost no hits at all), reads like vanity and spam.

Comment: Or you can run the search like this: over 120 hits searching for his lst name and the name of the church; instead of 31 hits by searching for his first middle and last name in quotations. Its all how you manipulate the search terms to get the effect you want. Its easy! Its fun! Try it at home! --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 21:23, 1 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

These articles are also part of the bundled AfD:

wikipediatrix 15:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - per nom. Wickethewok 17:47, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per WP:BIO. Mention of these people could be made at Pillar of Fire Church if it happens to survive the AfD it is currently undergoing.--Isotope23 19:56, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, and I'd extend that keep to all the bundled articles. I've never heard of these folks before, but I'd have to say that a multi-generational organization with "six congregations in the United States, two colleges, missions in six other countries, and three radio stations," and a history dating back almost a hundred years, meets notability criteria. That being the case, the bios on the leaders over the last century should also stay, by my reckoning. I'm no fan of churches (and missionary organizations in particular), but nonetheless this strikes me as a well-established social entity with international aspects, not some flash-in-the-pan storefront church. --Pagana 20:08, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Your comments are all regarding the church, not these people. The Church's own article is not included in this AfD. We're discussing the notability of these people as individuals here as per WP:BIO, not their Church's notability. And just because they're connected to the Church doesn't make them notable themselves. wikipediatrix 20:42, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I agree: just being "connected to the church" is not notable. But these bios seem like a good-faith attempt to document the leadership, over the better part of a century. It's worth noting that this isn't a "church" in the sense of a single building and congregation, but in the sense of a religious sect that appears to be spreading and growing. They're no Mormon church, but neither do they seem to be trivial. --Pagana 21:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

- Comment, the organization itself may be notable; but the individuals listed here don't meet WP:BIO; I'm having a hard time finding any reliable sources about any of these people that would establish that they meet WP:BIO. Everything I'm seeing is Wikipedia or mirrors.--Isotope23 20:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, per Isotope's comment. The church looks notable--the bishop in the church does not look so.-Kmaguir1 21:12, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. The Church is notable, and the founder is also notable by extention. However, the descendants of the founding dynasty of a family business are not, especially seeing that the entries are purely geneological and have the odd detail of where the went to school and which college they attended. These people are not nobles: Nobility may be inherited, but notability is not. Ohconfucius 06:33, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Why is the college someone attended an "odd detail"? Every biography lists where someone went to college. As a matter of fact each college has a category for alumi. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 21:18, 1 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep: An organization with the breadth, scope and history of the Pillar of Fire Church is exactly what belongs on Wikipedia. These articles are not merely about the "employees and their children" of this Church, but of its leadership. The top leaders of a religious denomination with the characteristics of the Pillar of Fire Church have a strong claim to notability, and the choice by the New York Times to publish obituaries for several of them is prima facie evidence of notability. I find it disturbing that so many are ready to choose to Delete, and not consider the possibility of a Merge. Alansohn 17:47, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Read this and tell me again why you think he has a "strong claim to notability". And by the way, getting a NYT obituary isn't even close to being "prima facie evidence of notability": 99.9 percent of the people who get NYT obituaries do not have Wikipedia articles and never will. If you don't believe me, select any issue of the paper from any year, check against Wikipedia, and see how far you get. wikipediatrix 18:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think you are confusing cause and effect. The fact that many subjects of NYT obituaries do not have Wikipedia articles only shows a failure to reach many worthy individuals as subjects of potential articles. The fact that the New York Times selects a handful of the hundreds of thousands of people who die each day for inclusion on the obituary pages is a very strong claim for notability that goes far beyond the far more trivial counting of Google hits. Alansohn 19:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Strong delete. Give him a few sentences in the Pilar of Fire Church article, and delete his entry, as there isn't enough noteworthy material here. Dr U 14:18, 31 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. The leader of a denomination is notable. The fact that many people who are the subject of a New York Times obituary do not have an article in Wikipedia is evidence that Wikipedia omits many notable people, not that the New York Times writes obituaries about people who are not notable. --TruthbringerToronto (Talk | contribs) 21:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Keep or at least merge into a section of the church article. This is the succession of leadership of a denomination. Per this discussion at WP:BIO, some editors consider even leaders of small congregations notable. These people seem to be more than that; Wikipedia is not paper. Gimmetrow 02:37, 2 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Nobody is saying that the succession of leadership of the church shouldn't be mentioned in the church's article. That can be done without giving these folks there own article. Dr U 03:18, 4 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep The Pillar of Fire Church is definatly notable and I argue that its' leaders and prominent members are notable as well. A seperate article for this particular leader is neccessary to provide context for the rest of the subject. Again, I reiterate, strong keep on all of the subjects of the bundled deletion. Regards, Shazbot85^Talk 03:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.