Talk:Mary Celeste

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Mary Celeste is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.

This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on December 4, 2015.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
March 9, 2015	Peer review	Reviewed
March 17, 2015	Featured article candidate	Promoted

Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on December 4, 2012, December 4, 2016, December 4, 2019, and December 4, 2023.

Current status: Featured article

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Marie Celeste suspected of attempted insurance fraud.

Shortly before the Marie Celeste disappeared a ship called 'The City of Boston' disappeared going around the north coast od Ireland whcich was discovered to be an enormous insurance fraud. Many, at the time, thought the Marie Celeste was a failed attempt! 207.225.17.155 (talk) 23:35, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

"Fanthorpe and Fanthorpe"?

The quote about Frederick Solly-Flood's IQ cites its source as "Fanthorpe and Fanthorpe, p. 80", implying that it's from a book written by authors with such names. But there is no other mention of a book from which this came from, making me puzzled as to what book this is referring to. 2A02:A31A:C23A:DD00:7956:8DA9:7CA:CD3 (talk) 06:51, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Fanthorpe and Fanthorpe is listed in Mary Celeste#Sources. Lionel Fanthorpe and his wife Patricia Fanthorpe have published a flood of popular books on various "mysteries", or forteana as his wikipedia article calls them. I am not convinced any of those books can be taken as reliable sources. User:Nø 15:00, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The use of {{sfn}} (see Help:Shortened footnotes) would have made the article more useful, as it would link the shortened footnote for Fanthorpe and Fanthorpe to the full citation. I continue to be surprised that reviewing editors do not insist on this for featured articles. Peaceray (talk) 16:26, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not “an” historian

Hard to believe this is still an issue, as the U.S. of an before a hard h is antiquated. See here [1] and here [2] 121.98.207.250 (talk) 12:46, 2 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This article doesn't use U.S. English. In British English a non-hard h pronunciation remains valid, and so the use of an remains valid. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:19, 2 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Please indicate where it is confirmed that this article does not use U.S. English. And please indicate where in British English that non-hard h is preferred. 222.155.184.19 (talk) 10:41, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Nikkimaria: There is the {{use American English|date=March 2015}} at the beginning of the wikitext (4th line). Peaceray (talk) 14:32, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hm, okay, thanks, hadn't seen that. I don't think that's correct but I suppose that's a broader conversation. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:30, 4 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sand Bar Theory

I read years ago that a captain, during modern times, was sailing his yacht very close to the route of the Mary Celeste. As he was going along his ship became stuck on a sandbar at some point I believe near, North Africa. As he waited for the tide to rise and or for the sand to shift from currents and waves he began to realize, as the ship broke free, that his very thing could have happened to the Mary Celeste. He reasoned that the captain and crew of the Mary Celeste figured that the boat would stay and after a while made preparation is to go ashore in the ship's boat and turned around to find that the Mary Celeste had drifted away. This area of North Africa was pretty hostile desert territory, from what I remember reading, which might explain why the crew and passengers were never heard from again. KrisCollino (talk) 05:22, 23 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Nice speculation, but without citations that is what we call original research, which is disallowed in English Wikipedia. Peaceray (talk) 06:20, 23 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]