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Obituary

Remembering Wikipedia contributor Brian Boulton

Boulton is sitting on a grassy beach while wearing a blue sweater over a white collared shirt
2014: Brian Boulton enjoys his holiday.

In December, Wikipedia lost one of the best editors in its history, Brian Boulton. With over 100 featured articles to his name and more than 14 years experience, Brian was certainly an editor to look out for. Today, we delve into his life and great contributions to this project.

The life of Brian

Brian Boulton was born on 4 July 1937. When he was 7 years old, he and his brother David lived with their Aunt Ena in Liverpool. This was at the end of World War II, and that year in Liverpool would leave a profound impact on him. Despite only living there a short time, as recently as 2011 he still considered himself Liverpudlian.

He married his wife Barbara in 1958, and in 2018 they celebrated 60 years of marriage. Together they raised three children.

On Wikipedia

Before registering an account on Wikipedia, Brian Boulton made this edit to add some information to Kenneth Baker. Though, after suffering from a serious illness in real life, Brianboulton would soon register his username in November 2007. His first user page stated his intentions quite clearly.

It was not particularly long before Brian managed to get his first two articles to Featured article status; though he was not without guidance from SandyGeorgia.

A barnstar made of stone that is slightly by grass
The Epic Barnstar – Dutifully given by Pdebee

Until the week of his death, Brian Boulton continued his long history of contributions to Wikipedia. On 30 November 2019, he received his last token of thanks from Pdebee: the Epic Barnstar (depicted above).

One of Brianboulton's long-term projects was trying to bring Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration to featured topic status. As of the time of writing, the following reflects the progress that has been made so far:

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Brian

In the context, please see also Brian's talk page (where his family is also watching) and the thanks to him on Project Opera by Voceditenore, who said "He was without a doubt the finest editor that Wikipedia has seen.". --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:28, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  • Born 1937! I thought Brian was a year younger than I am (b. 1952), and – wicked old creature – he didn't disabuse me of this error. He certainly didn't look like 1937 vintage, as anyone who met him in recent years will surely agree. And meeting him was such a treat. He was a member of Middlesex CCC, and I cherish the memory of him absenting himself from a county match at Lord's to join me for a long lunch at an Italian restaurant in St John's Wood High Street. There were other convivial and fairly disgraceful outings, too, though one often met him en route to or coming back from visiting ailing old friends. As for his contributions to Wikipedia, the word "incomparable" cannot be avoided – not only his 100+ featured articles, but his year-in-year-out encouragement, guidance and kindness when reviewing other editors' articles. Not that "kindness" meant any diminution of his rigorous standards. I once suggested that an FAC article on some sporting topic or other might be permitted a less elevated standard of prose than those on more intellectual subjects and BB gently ticked me off for sloppy thinking. He was right of course. Several of us have put his FAs on our watchlists and will strive to preserve his matchless articles in good order. He leaves a magnificent legacy, but he leaves a BB-shaped gap too, and he will be missed so much by countless people here, including Tim riley talk 23:41, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

















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