Talk:Mason–Dixon line: Difference between revisions

This article is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. United States: Delaware / West Virginia Start‑class Top‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles Start This article has been rated as Start-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by WikiProject Delaware (assessed as Top-importance). This article is supported by WikiProject West Virginia (assessed as High-importance). Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Pennsylvania Start‑class High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Pennsylvania, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Pennsylvania on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PennsylvaniaWikipedia:WikiProject PennsylvaniaTemplate:WikiProject PennsylvaniaPennsylvania articles Start This article has been rated as Start-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Maryland Start‑class High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Maryland, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the U.S. state of Maryland on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.MarylandWikipedia:WikiProject MarylandTemplate:WikiProject MarylandMaryland articles Start This article has been rated as Start-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. British Empire Unassessed This article is within the scope of WikiProject British Empire, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of British Empire on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.British EmpireWikipedia:WikiProject British EmpireTemplate:WikiProject British EmpireBritish Empire articles ??? This article has not yet received a rating on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. ??? This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Geography Start‑class Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Geography, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of geography on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GeographyWikipedia:WikiProject GeographyTemplate:WikiProject Geographygeography articles Start This article has been rated as Start-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. WikiProject Geography To-do list: Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Article requests : See Requested articles/Social sciences/Geography, cities, regions and named places and Missing articles about Locations Assess : Tag related article talk pages with {{WikiProject Geography}}. To help assess the quality and importance of geography articles, please see: Unassessed geography articles and Unknown-importance geography articles. Cleanup : See Geography articles needing attention Deletion sorting : Listed at Geographic related deletion discussions Geographical coordinates : See Articles missing geocoordinate data by country Infobox : See Geography articles needing infoboxes Map : See Wikipedia requested maps Notability : See Geography articles with topics of unclear notability Photo : See Wikipedia requested photographs of places Stubs : See Geography stubs Geographical coordinates Mason–Dixon line is of interest to WikiProject Geographical coordinates, which encourages the use of geographical coordinates in Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.Geographical coordinatesWikipedia:WikiProject Geographical coordinatesTemplate:WikiProject Geographical coordinatesGeographical coordinates articles Popular culture (inactive) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Popular culture, a project which is currently considered to be inactive.Popular cultureWikipedia:WikiProject Popular cultureTemplate:WikiProject Popular culturePopular culture articles

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Mason–Dixon line article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1Auto-archiving period: 30 days

A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the On this day section on October 11, 2015.

Article has an unreferenced section tag on it dated October 2012. While looking up some material for another article I found a source on surveying history (The makers of surveying instruments in America since 1700) that has some of the details on the project. I will try to map some of those into the article... Cheers Risk Engineer (talk) 10:45, 23 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"During such survey work it is normal to survey along the length of the line and then survey back to the starting point which with no errors would coincide." That sentence is really pretty obscure. GeneCallahan (talk) 01:51, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"During such survey work it is normal to survey along the length of the line and then to survey back to the starting point; ideally there would be no return error at all, while typically there would be return errors that were random - . . ."

EdK (talk) 11:44, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Just a reminder - it's not WP:RS. See Wikipedia:Imdb#IMDb. Likewise, most of the text in the "popular culture" section is WP:OR since the opinions expressed are unsourced TEDickey (talk) 10:32, 2 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes they are now--Godwhale (talk) 18:59, 5 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There are sources given, but (a) not all of the opinions are "sourced", and (b) the ones given aren't cited so that someone can verify them. TEDickey (talk) 21:14, 5 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The text in this page as well as The_Wedge_(border) seems to indicate that the land between the North Line and the Arc Line was intended to be in Delaware. The blue color of that zone in the image goes the same way. But looking at modern maps, it seems that that land is in fact in MD. The text in Delaware ("Diagram of the Twelve-Mile Circle, the Mason-Dixon Line and "The Wedge". All blue and white areas are inside Delaware, except for the small sliver of Maryland on the western extremity of the circle.") also lean toward MD. Clarifications please. 199.84.44.28 (talk) 23:32, 7 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Entries lacking at least a link to an existing topic haven't any links to a reliable source. The reader shouldn't have to do a web-search to see the one- or two-line mention of Dixie in the lyrics. TEDickey (talk) 10:35, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The repetition of Sailing to Philadelphia of course, is done for purely promotional purposes. There's no need for that, either. TEDickey (talk) 10:38, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There is NOTHING promotional about Sailing to Philadelphia in this article, as it clearly does relate to the subject at hand. Please refrain from adding commentary or your own personal analysis to Wikipedia articles. Doing so violates Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy and breaches the formal tone expected in an encyclopedia. Thank you. 71.176.14.40 (talk) 04:01, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is certainly promotional, essentially making STP the main items in the trivia category, providing more words than in any of the WP:RS, and given the editing history, appears to be mostly 1-2 individuals promoting it. TEDickey (talk) 08:15, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please refrain from making unconstructive edits to Wikipedia. Your edits appear to constitute vandalism and have been reverted or removed. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. Thank you. 71.176.14.40 (talk) 10:58, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Try to stick to finding WP:RS rather than focusing on personal attacks. So far, your edits are nonconstructive TEDickey (talk) 11:00, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

YOU try to stick to WP:RS. This has been demonstrated already on the article page for Sailing to Philadelphia already. So far, your nonconstructive edits constitute WP:BIAS and are indicative of vandalism. 71.176.14.40 (talk) 11:04, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The most recent edit is an improvement. The given sources still need work to support the statements made TEDickey (talk) 20:47, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Glad you concur, although YOU could have made the same edits yourself instead of nitpicking, TEDickey. Thanks for your assistance. 71.176.14.40 (talk) 21:01, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In 1958, guitarist Duane Eddy released a 7" single containing the song "Mason Dixon Lion," which is sometimes referred to as "Mason Dixon Line." See [2] and [3]. However, it won't hurt my feelings if it's not included. berfle (talk) 01:55, 29 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Shouldn't items listed under Popular Culture be only those that refer to the actual Dixon, Mason, or their Line? We are accumulating references to characters named Mason Dixon and Dixon Mason, and I feel just using the names is too far from the actual topic to merit a reference.BillHart93 (talk) 12:56, 29 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The article mentions Cavendish's theory of the Allegheny mountains influencing Mason's measurements, and also the subsequent Schiehallion experiment. What I'm missing here is the final conclusion: Was Cavendish correct? Was it the mountains? Was there some other reason for the systematic errors? Or was the issue never cleared up completely? --BjKa (talk) 12:25, 30 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Danson's article "The Work of Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon", and other sources have discussed the effects of variations in the direction of gravity on the line. See bibliography at Mason Dixon Preservation Partnership web site http://www.mdlpp.org As I recall, the line wanders about 900 feet from a geodetic line of latitude, but only 200 feet (and usually a lot less) from a line of astronomical latitude, the main difference being due to deflection of the gravity vertical, or of a plumb bob. Attraction of mountains is a major contributor to this, but you don't have to be on a mountain to have such effects. NGS data shows 5.5 seconds change (about 550 feet) in deflection of latitude (Xi factor) between southern Philadelphia and the Stargazer Stone, still some distance from significant mountains. BillHart93 (talk) 15:23, 30 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The lead paragraphs go into too much detail on this subject. Someone recently tried to simplify it but made a messy edit that was reverted. Should most of this material be put in a separate section and only a sentence left in the lead? BillHart93 (talk) 22:10, 30 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The fact that this grammatically incorrect version of the name appears in one official document of the time doesn't necessarily mean that the line was (or, more to the point, is today) "also called Mason's and Dixon's line". I'd like to see a more scholarly source for this assertion. WCCasey (talk) 06:29, 10 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It appears in multiple official documents through the end of the 19th century. It is not a colloquialism now (but then, Wikipedia is not a jargon dictionary). TEDickey (talk) 10:05, 10 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

OK, good. It shouldn't be hard, then to find a better source. Failing that, I'd like to at least change the wording - like "sometimes called Mason's and Dixon's line through the end of the 19th century" WCCasey (talk) 03:31, 11 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Looking around the other day, it seemed that there were a half-dozen usable sources, and that I noticed nothing more recent than around 1915. ttyl TEDickey (talk) 22:03, 11 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]