Talk:Resolute desk

More Evenden and Chatham Dockyard Joiners Shop

Chatham Dockyard's Joiner Shop, where William Evenden worked

Incase we ever find room, here is an image of the Joiners Shop at Chatham Dockayrd where where William Evenden worked and the desk was likely built. Also, The British Museum has 4 hop tokens created by a William Evenden from roughly the same time period. It might be from him, might not, but they are the only other objects I can find that he may have made.--Found5dollar (talk) 22:23, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

Design

The article states that Morant, Boyd, & Blanford won the design competition. Why then does the article say that it was "probably" built in accordance with their design? Is there some reason to think that the builder did not follow it?Bill (talk) 22:22, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Billposer: Betty Monkman's book The White House: Its Historic Furnishings and First Families is the most reliable source we have about the desk. On page 294 she list the desk as being made "probably from a design by Morant, Boyd & Blanford." It doesn't seem the original drawing or plans of the desk have survived, but the similar one with the carvings Queen Victoria and then President Rutherford B. Hayes has. Because of this there is no actual proof the design as it currently stands was by Morant, Boyd & Blanford but everything points to that it was.--Found5dollar (talk) 13:39, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

Telephones

Having previously gone on record as being opposed to adding anything about items on the desk, I'll just throw this out: The phones in president Biden's Oval Office. It's mostly about Biden's phones but also talks about the Diet Coke button. GA-RT-22 (talk) 23:32, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for this! I've seen this floating around before but was never quite sure where to put the info.--Found5dollar (talk) 13:49, 24 October 2021 (UTC)

"feet on the desk" photos

Inehmo recently added two pictures, one of Obama and one of Carter, with their feet on the desk. I just want to start a conversation because I feel these photos, while well intentioned, are unnecessary. To get them to fit the images have to be so small they are not really legible. We also have pictures of both presidents using the desk elsewhere and we had a previous discussion about there being to many images of Obama already on the page. I concede that the picture of Obama with his feet on the desk does have historical significance, but I'm worried it is just too much for the page.--Found5dollar (talk) 20:50, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

I think the size of the images is not a problem, because usually, the user can click to view them in full screen size. (Something is preventing this at the moment, I am not sure what.) Even in small size, they convey just enough of the idea. These are rare images of presidents in a relaxed pose, and by themselves worthy of being seen. More importantly, they are directly relevant to the text and they add significant value to it by corroborating the statements. On my screen, the balance of the text and the images is not threatened just yet. I would welcome more images of other presidents – especially ones with their feet up on the table. – Inehmo (talk) 21:51, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

Comments

Responding to a request at FAC talk, some comments on the article:

• First-time nominators are subject to a spotcheck for verifiability and avoidance of plagiarism and close paraphrasing. I think there is the potential for this to flag verifiability/OR issues with this article, which should be addressed prior to nominating. For example, "While the Resolute desk has resided in the Oval Office since it was returned in 1993 by President Clinton, it has been occasionally disassembled and moved out of the room. Moving the desk out mostly happens during renovations and updates to the space. It was removed in 2005, during the George W. Bush presidency, for a renovation where the flooring of the Oval Office was replaced." is cited to this source. That source can verify that flooring was removed from the office in 2005. It can't verify the first two sentences, nor can it really confirm that the desk was removed in 2005 - at most you can say it isn't where it can be seen in the photo.
  • I just removed the entire section. I had shuffled that information around a few times but it never seemed to make much sense.--Found5dollar (talk) 02:48, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• The organization of the article is a bit hard to follow at the moment. For example, why is the paragraph about moving it out during renovations under Design? Why is Timeline a separate section rather than a subsection of History?
  • moved Timeline to a subsection of History--Found5dollar (talk) 02:48, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Along those lines, there is some potentially confusing overlap between sections. For example, the Design section discusses disagreement about whether Roosevelt did or didn't request the panel addition, but then the History section just says he did and nothing more
  • moved all information beyond a description of the kneehole panel to a new section in history explicitly about Roosevelt and the panel's addition.--Found5dollar (talk) 03:21, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• The lead has five paragraphs, which is more than is usual, and the article isn't particularly long - suggest reducing
  • Reduced size of lead to 3 paragraphs--Found5dollar (talk) 03:34, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Make sure the article is as accessible as possible to non-specialists. For example, what is the right to salvage?
  • linked Right to salvage and combed through the article for other terms that may not be commonly known.--Found5dollar (talk) 02:05, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

• Conversely, avoid including extraneous details - for example, why do we care about the specific addresses of Morant, Boyd, & Blanford?
  • Removed the addresses of Morant, Boyd, and Blanford, the drinks Roosevelt made on the desk, and the aside about the Carter's love of American art.--Found5dollar (talk) 20:52, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

• Images hosted on Wikimedia Commons have to include a licensing tag for both the US and (if different) their country of origin, and to facilitate an image review it would be helpful to make sure there is sufficient information provided to verify the accuracy of the tagging. For example, the tag currently on File:William_Evenden_(cropped).jpg indicates that an additional US tag is needed.
  • checked and updated tags on all images.--Found5dollar (talk) 21:29, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

• Avoid sandwiching text between images/templates
  • I believe I have fixed all sandwiching.--Found5dollar (talk) 19:58, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

• Some of the sources are of questionable reliability - for example, Salon.com is listed at WP:RSP as having no consensus on reliability. For all sources, make sure you could answer what makes it a reliable source
  • Salon and another unreliable source, Business Insider, are both used for a quote. Per BLP policy the quote needs a reliable source. This is supposedly from Valerie's book so shouldn't be hard to find. GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
  •  Done GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:21, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• Similar citations should be formatted similarly - for example, "White House Historical Association" is italicized in footnote 11 but not in footnote 12. There's currently a mix of templated and untemplated citations, which tends to contribute to inconsistency - settle on one or the other approach, and then think about what goes in which field and which fields get included when.
  • I fixed the WHHA refs but we should check for others. GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• Dates should include a comma after the year
  • I think they do now? GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• Ranges should use endashes
  • I think they do now? GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• Make sure that language is consistent - for example, sometimes you use "arctic" and other times "Arctic"
  • I fixed Arctic but we should check for other inconsistencies. GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• "The fate of the ship was frequently brought up in British press". You mentioned two ships in the previous para - should ship be ships here, or was only one brought up?
  • Fixed GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• Ellipses aren't needed at the beginning of quotes
  • The MOS doesn't say to leave them out, but I agree they are not needed and have removed them. GA-RT-22 (talk) 18:04, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

• The article would benefit from a copy-editing runthrough - eg "one of the four-member intuitions". Nikkimaria (talk) 01:15, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Nikkimaria Thank you so much for these comments! I will work through them and ping you again when I believe I have addressed them all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Found5dollar (talk • contribs) 04:10, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Boogers

Probably too trivial to include here. Elon Musk’s Son Picks His Nose and Wipes It on Donald Trump’s Desk GA-RT-22 (talk) 05:00, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

"...also known as the Hayes desk", undue?

Using and boldfacing 'Hayes desk' in the first sentence seems undue, and arguable should be removed. Please view these n-grams, which find no mention of 'Hayes desk'. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 02:48, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

If we use it we should bold it, but it's only mentioned one other place in the article so I could go along with removing it from the opening sentence. Unless it turns out that's the official name or has some other significance. I haven't checked the cited source. GA-RT-22 (talk) 13:11, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

It is also called the Hayes desk in Betty Monkman's book. Even if it is not a common mane for the desk, it is still used in a very prominent reference that is the most research driven of the references we have, and the one of the only ones from an actual White House Curator. Even if it is not incredibly common it is still a name for the desk. I would keep it. --Found5dollar (talk) 20:36, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Was the Resolute desk moved to Mar-a-Lago in 2025?

Is it true that the Resolute desk was moved to Mar-a-Lago in 2025 (or replaced by a replica)? ~2025-31208-44 (talk) 00:04, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

No GA-RT-22 (talk) 01:49, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

There is a poorly made replica on dispaly at Mar-a-Lago. I just added one sentence to the article about it. Soure: --Found5dollar (talk) 17:20, 16 November 2025 (UTC)

@Found5dollar: Someone just added a whole paragraph about it to the lead. I moved it down to the Replica section but it should be consolidated with your one sentence somehow, assuming it's the same replica. GA-RT-22 (talk) 11:24, 17 April 2026 (UTC)