Talk:Preston Tucker

Untitled

What the heck? Someone please fix this. First it includes a large, badly-formatted paragraph of unrelated information; then everything is deleted except a date of death. I suspect vandalism. I won't touch it without a second opinion, though. -- Erik Carson 16:13, 2004 May 16 (UTC)

Clarity

The article reads that the Tucker factory was "shuttered". This is a little colloquial and doesnt shed much light on what happened. On what grounds was it seized, ann why did he not get it back after the trial?

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Dear Wikipedians,

I learnt that Preston Tucker's life and fate was so connected with Tucker automobile that no separate entry for him is practicable. I think the lines about him should be transferred to Tucker automobile and this stub should be cancelled. OK?

--Millisits 14:55, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Dear Readers of this page, I cannot see any reaction to my above proposal, so I am going to make it soon. Of course, Preston Tucker would be a good redirect to Tucker automobile. --Millisits 16:26, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Cleanup

I added a cleanup tag to this article, it's a hideous mess. Several issues I noted:

• the "open letter" is repeated twice in the article
• the article starts out with chronology and then goes back to ground it covered to cover it again
• I sense possible copyright infringement issues with much of the article
• This article has no sources

Basically I think some experienced editors need to have at this article, perhaps I'll give it a try if I have time.

--Wgfinley 14:45, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

The following item should be considered for revision as there is no clear reason to cite the U.S. Attorney's political affiliation. If it is established that he was prosecuted for political reasons, a connection should be made and some references cited.

24.166.31.246 04:56, 4 November 2007 (UTC)Tony Silva

"Tucker's innovative business idea was investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the liberal Democratic United States Attorney Otto Kerner, and led to an indictment of Tucker and six other Tucker Corporation executives for fraud on June 10, 1949."

Cleanup Started

I did a major gutting of the article, most of the deleted section was narrative related to the Torpedo and rightfully belongs in the Torpedo article. I did splice some parts from it though here and there where useful. I brought in a part or two from the Torpedo article to have this make sense for now. My idea is a thorough rewrite but for now I wanted to "take out the garbage" and start with a somewhat clean slate.

I've been in touch with the Tucker Club of America and they have been supportive of a rewrite and are going to contribute some photos and other images to make this a much better article. They will also help fact check it for accuracy. I hope to begin working on the rewrite soon. --Wgfinley 22:21, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

preston tucker

i think it would be helpfull to know exactly how he died, what kind of cancer did he have ? and was he sick for along time ect..

Lung cancer. He was a heavy smoker. The government probably killed him with all the stress they put on him trying to shut him down. Economizer 19:41, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Government scam

What a scam the government pulled on this guy. This is a classic case of competitors teaming up with government in order to crush a competitor who had a superior product. Economizer 19:37, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Though he did have a reputation for sailing a bit close to the wind even before WW2. Ted Miller - the son of Harry Miller with whom Tucker collaborated on a number of projects - said of him "he wanted to be a con-man, but he didn't know how".Mr Larrington (talk) 14:37, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Biased article

This article (and I'm looking mostly at the SEC trial and Speculation sections as I note this) is using language that is very much biased in favor of Tucker. Note that I know nothing about the guy and I'm not claiming he was guilty. But the language/tone of those sections contains opinion after opinion written as though it were fact, obviously with the purpose of drawing the conclusion for the reader that Tucker was innocent, rather than just presenting the facts and letting the reader draw their own conclusions. Some examples:

• "Another publication, Collier's magazine, ran a slanderous article ... This article was reprinted in Readers Digest as well, expanding the news media's slander of Preston Tucker." Did some court or legal authority determine the article constituted slander? If so, this fact should be mentioned and cited. If not, then the adjective "slanderous" is just the opinion of whatever Wikipedia editor wrote those (most probably not a legal professional) and shouldn't be there.

• "Tucker's lead attorney (Kirby) demolished Turnbull's claims on cross-examination ... " The characterization of the cross-examination as "demolishing" the testimony hostile to Tucker is, again, a matter of opinion.

• "Before the jury was released to deliberate the judge told them 'The fact that the defendants and those associated with them failed to mass-produce an automobile and accomplish what they undertook is not of itself proof of fraud,' suggesting that their deliberations must focus on whether Tucker actually intended to defraud, rather than simply tried and failed to bring a car to market successfully, which is in and of itself not illegal." This isn't nearly as bad as the other offenses, but still the prose is bending over backward to remind the reader of the difference between fraud and a failed business venture. While it might be appropriate for a judge in a trial to bend over backward to remind his jury of that, when an encyclopedia article does it for the reader, that makes the prose sound biased.

• "Over 400,000 drawings/blueprints, corporate documents, and letters organized by Tucker collectors of the Tucker Automobile Club of America suggest that Preston Tucker was ready to mass produce the Tucker '48. These documents prove that Tucker wasn't simply building prototype parts, but was developing the manufacturing process to mass produce the Tucker '48." Telling the reader what the documents "suggest" isn't great; telling the reader what they "prove" is worse. How about telling the reader what they said and letting the reader decide what that suggests or proves in their own mind?

• "This controversy lives on, but the large volume of evidence collected by Tucker historians supports the conclusion that Preston Tucker was on his way to mass producing the Tucker '48, provided he could continue to raise sufficient funds." Is there a widespread historical consensus for this conclusion? Or is it just the opinion of whatever Wikipedia editor wrote this? (I'm not asking rhetorically; I genuinely don't know.) If it's the latter, then obviously that a problem; if it's the former, then there needs to be some WP:RS citation added to support the statement.

• "Tucker simply ran out of time and money before his dreams could be realized. Without these outside influences Tucker may have been successful." As clear an example as one can have of first drawing the conclusion for the reader and then offering a speculative opinion as though it were documented fact.

Again, I don't know anything about Tucker beyond what I've read here, so I'm by no means trying to argue that he was guilty. For all I know, he may have been pure as the driven snow, and all of the above pro-Tucker opinions may well be 100% true. But true or not, they are opinions, so this article ought not be presenting them as though they are facts. 12.155.58.181 (talk) 21:24, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

It would have been nice if someone who knows the subject better than I had addressed the above, but since no one is doing so, I'm being bold and re-writing or removing the biased parts myself. 12.155.58.181 (talk) 20:17, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Can someone fix the lead?

And remove that 'hi man is joe' thing? Thanks. GrayFullbuster (talk) 16:07, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Peter Dun?

The article on the history of Dun And Bradstreet makes no mention of this individual. In fact, the only references on Google to Peter Dun related to Dun & Bradstreet are circular back to this very article. I think the reference is unsupportable and possibly intentional misinformation. Warped War (talk) 20:45, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

I put that information in based on a personal conversation I had with renowned Tucker collector Mr. David Cammack in 2009, that was his contention that Dun and Bradstreet bought the rights. In he does mention that Dun and Bradstreet were involved in the deconstruction of the Tucker corporation but does not confirm that they held the rights to the name in the end. He does confirm that Tucker lost the rights to his own name and could not build cars under the Tucker name ever again in the USA. 2601:282:8301:CCA0:84A0:374:C830:B05C (talk) 10:49, 11 July 2017 (UTC) My username is Nickshu but when I login everytime I click over to the talk page it logs me out.

References

Turret was not actually widely used

I put tags on the claim the turret ws widely used, a long timeago.

No one addressed my concerns, so I removed the questionable claims. Geo Swan (talk) 22:02, 4 November 2017 (UTC)