Talk:John Mercer Johnson

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Good articleJohn Mercer Johnson has been listed as one of the History good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
September 7, 2021Good article nomineeListed
Did You Know
A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on July 1, 2021.
The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that John Mercer Johnson, a Father of Canadian Confederation, entertained the public and members of the London Conference of 1866 with poetry readings and ice-skating performances?

Untitled[edit]

Johnson was born in 1818 in Liverpool (England). Brought to New Brunswick by his father, he becomes lawyer, then appointed in 1850. He is successively Solicitor General, Minister for the Stations, chair Room and Attorney General. He is delegated to the conference of Quebec in 1864 and that of London in 1866. After the confederation in 1867, Johnson is elected with the new House of Commons of the federal Parliament. Supported in Liverpool, England, John Mercer Johnson emigrated in Canada with his/her father while always a child. Johnson received its first education of childhood at the school of grammar of the county of Northumberland before studying the law. In 1840 it was called with the bar of New Brunswick and began a career as a lawyer. Johnson wrote the policy in 1850 after being elected in the provincial assembly to represent her county at the house of Northumberland. Only four years after having written the unit, Johnson found a place in the box as lawyer -- General. Later in its political life it would serve the positions of the General agent-General, postmaster, and the speaker of the Parliament. With the conference of Charlottetown and the two following conferences discussing the confederation, Johnson asserted fact vigorously that the provincial governments should not hold any power above the course the county or zone.

Relative of John Mercer Johnson[edit]

I am John Mercer Johnson's great, great,great,great grandchild. I live in No. Hampton, N.H.. Is there any info youcan provide where I can further research my ancestry thu JM Johnson?

thxs Don Bennett dbinc@comcast.net

Wow, I do have some information on him, but he was a father of confederation. Why are you living in New Hampshire?Milesgilbert (talk) 02:56, 31 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]


Sorry it's taken so long to get back with you. I am living in NH because John Mercer Johnsons' son William Cross Johnson moved to Massachusettes with his son Fred. Fred is my grandfather. I now live in NH which is just 50 miles north of Massachusettes where I grew up. Do you have any information you can share on how I can get hold of living relatives in New Brunswick? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:188:C401:DEB1:BCA0:2883:4D62:98D2 (talk) 17:37, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup[edit]

@Z1720: Hi! I also proposed a DYK for Canada Day ("Canadian Idiot"). I think this one should get priority, though my nomination is actually about an American topic so I don't see why they couldn't both run on the same day. I did a little MOS cleanup on this article and have a few copyedit notes:

  • In the lead, from Province of New Brunswick, Canada and a Father of Confederation. I'm not sure that's technically correct as pre-Confederation Canada only referred to Ontario and Quebec, and the Province of New Brunswick was not yet a part of Canada. Could it be rephrased as something like "From the Province of New Brunswick and a Father of Canadian Confederation" or "from the Province of New Brunswick (in what is now Canada) and a Father of Confederation"?
    • Canada existed for one year of Johnson's life (Confederation is 1857, he died 1858) so this sentence is technically correct, but not for the majority of his life. I included Canada because most people don't know where New Brunswick is. Maybe we can put the word "Canada" somewhere else in the lede sentence? one suggestion might be "from the Province of New Brunswick, and a Father of Canadian Confederation?
  • MOS:JRSR suggests to explain in words if the person is not referred to in reliable sources as Jr. e.g.: "the younger Jackson was elected mayor".
    • Changed
  • While in London he entertained the other members and the public with a poetry presentation and ice skating performance. I've got to ask, was this a single performance in which he read poetry while ice skating, or two separate performances? If the latter case, perhaps "and an ice skating performance".
    • The source says it was more than one performance, so I pluralized both. The quote is, "While there he dazzled the public and the members with his poetry presentations and his dazzling ice skating performances." (Copp)
  • for their work in representing Miramichi. This is the first mention of Miramichi in the article. It could use some explanatory context or a link to an article on its subject.
    • Added "one of the cities in Johnson's Northumberland County constituency."
  • On October 9, 1845, he married Henrietta Shirreff and had twelve children. I think this literally means that they had all twelve children on that day. Suggest: "Shirreff with whom he had twelve children." or "Shireff; they had twelve children." Or perhaps better to break the sentence. "They had twelve children,[2] six of whom survived into adulthood."
    • Added a semi-colon

Let me know if you have any questions, and thanks for improving this article for a Canada Day DYK! – Reidgreg (talk) 12:10, 24 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Hi Reidgreg, thanks for your comments and doing a copyedit of the article. Since 8 hooks run per day at DYK (and sometimes 16) I think we can have both of our hooks run on Canada Day. I responded to your concerns above. I hope to hear your responses soon. Z1720 (talk) 16:41, 24 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • Looks great! I tidied with two tiny changes. My DYK has been approved and I left a note for the promoter to give priority to this DYK in case only one can run on July 1. I will try to keep an eye on them until then. – Reidgreg (talk) 17:38, 24 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • Reidgreg another option might be to create a Canada Day hook set: to have 8 or 16 hooks that could run on the main page that day concerning Canada. If we get consensus for this on WT:DYK we could see if others at WP:CANADA want to join in. Z1720 (talk) 18:41, 24 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Bloom6132: We've got a couple other Canada Day DYKs. (Ignore the copy edit stuff at the top half of this section). Alongside your nomination of Template:Did you know nominations/Flag of Nova Scotia, we already have approved Template:Did you know nominations/John Mercer Johnson (Father of Confederation) and Template:Did you know nominations/Canadian Idiot‎ ("Weird Al" Yankovic song). The former has a picture. – Reidgreg (talk) 22:05, 29 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]