OK guys, this might get a little long, but it is interesting!
In July 2018 I wrote an article for my blog about the 100 years of numbered highways in Illinois (https://n9jigblog.wordpress.com/2018/07/) and also posted it to my “Illinois Highways Page” webpage at www.n9jig.com I know it is kind of an obscure subject, but I have studied, researched, and explored the Illinois Route Numbering system for years and am probably the foremost expert on the subject that is not employed by IDOT. My webpage at www.n9jig.com is chock full of my original research and describes in detail the origin and evolution of the system.
As part of my interest in Illinois history in general I subscribe to several Facebook groups on the subject, one of which owned and hosted by Neil Gale, who stylizes himself as a “Ph.D”. In June 2022 he posted almost verbatim my 2018 post about the Illinois route numbering system to his blog and then a link to that post at his “Living History of Illinois and Chicago” Facebook group on June 10. In neither did he credit me as the original author of the work.
When I emailed him at his contact info asking about this, he never acknowledged it. Of course, these days that email could well have ended up in his spam, so I also posted a comment to his blog entry as well as the Facebook group asking for the credit I deserve for writing the article.
His response to that was to delete the comments on his blog and Facebook group as well as ban me from the group. He never replied to my email or posts directly, just banned me. At least I know he saw it anyway. Of course, I have other Facebook accounts and see that the post is still there and still not credited to me. On his blog he did later add the notation of “Illinois Highways Page” at the bottom but not my name, a link nor indication of the actual source for the material. Some of the images he used were from my webpage as well.
So far we just have a supposed historian stealing original research without attribution, plagiarism I am sure. (As a side note, plagiarism does not need be for profit to be wrong, despite the “Dr.”’s statement to the contrary on his blog.)
But wait, it gets better!
I did a little research as I was annoyed at his actions. He introduces himself as “Dr. Neil Gale, Ph. D.” (https://drloihjournal.blogspot.com/p/hello.html. Also at http://drgale.com/)
I found out that he claims a doctorate from the “London Institute of Applied Research” at a website promoting his web marketing business (https://bio.prlog.org/GaleWebMarketing/50000508-neil-gale.html)
OK, sounds good, he must be a learned man, right? Let’s look at his alma mater; the London Institute for Applied Research (or L.I.A.R.). Hmm… L.I.A.R.? Yep! LIAR is a “Diploma Mill”, or at least it was. It was created by a guy named John Bear in the 1970’s as a joke, to generate fake diplomas in protest of his own (legitimate) university presenting honorary doctorates to celebrities in return for large donations while he had to earn his by actually studying and doing the work (https://www.cityofsmoke.com/archives/1565 and others). Do a Google search on the “London Institute of Applied Research”, some of the results are hilarious.
So now we have a guy who copies research and presents it as his own, has a fake doctorate from a joke institution and ghosts people who call him out. What else has he done?
I find it interesting that he posted on his blog the following:
“On July 28, 2020, I was removed and blocked from the “Abraham Lincoln” Facebook group because I provided proof that the post a member made was not at all truthful. Little did I know the person was a group Administrator. After sleeping on the issue, I decided to start a new Facebook group the following day, (with a similar name on the same topic).” (also at http://drgale.com/)
Pot, Kettle, black.
Follow up:
I emailed this diatribe of mine to Mr. Gale (I will not call him “Dr. Gale”) on July 20, 2022 and offered him until July 31 the chance to properly credit me and remove the fake degree notation from his pages. I basically told him that if I were properly attributed and he removed the fake degree and honorifics from his pages I would not post this.
A couple days later I get a message from a “Mary Smith” who said she was an admin for this “Dr.” Gale’s Facebook Group and his blog. He said he was in rehab for physical therapy after an injury. She said she deleted the article from his blog (it appears that at least is true). I see this as a tacit admission of improper attribution at minimum or outright plagiarism at worst. But she did not deny or explain the lack of attribution. I asked about his fake degree from LIAR and she said that he has a Ph. D from the University of Oxford and that it has been hanging in his office for years and never mentioned LIAR. She said there was nothing more that she could do for me and has not responded to my follow-up message. I suspect “Mary Smith” is probably our good “Doctor” himself rather than a different person. It appears Gale has recovered because he has been posting to the Facebook group the last few days.
If someone like this guy actually held a doctorate degree from such a distinguished and well-known institution such as Oxford, wouldn’t he want to plaster that over every webpage he owned, especially his marketing ones? He only claims the fake LIAR “degree” on his marketing pages. Even if LIAR was a real university, if you were trying to drum up business wouldn’t you note an Oxford degree instead?
I tried to verify a degree held by Neil Gale from Oxford and can find no evidence one exists. Oxford cannot verify it and a web search shows no independent indication he ever attended much less was conferred any type of degree, doctorate or otherwise.
I have since been contacted by another person who has had a similar situation with this guy who had allegedly claimed credit for his work and was called out. This person was then booted off the forums controlled by the fake doctor and subsequently received odd mailings with pictures of his home and mentions of personal details that were perceived as veiled threats.
The next day I received notifications two attempts to change my Facebook password. Coincidence? Perhaps, but the timing is remarkable.
I had hopes that Neil Gale would acknowledge his error in attribution of others work and come clean on the status of his degree (if he actually has one). I really do not like outing someone but academic fraud is wrong and, frankly, he pissed me off. I actually have a college degree that I earned the hard way (studying, taking tests, doing papers and dissertations…) I have taken advanced schools for my profession and earned the certificates that come with them. I did a lot of research for my blog posts and do not mind sharing. If he had acknowledged this in the first place, I would have been fine with it, but he had to claim it as his own and then make it look like I was the bad guy when called out.
Well, I did what I said I would, I waited until August 1 to post this. While “Mary Smith” did arrange to delete the plagiarized article from Mr. Gale’s blog the original Facebook post pointing to it is still there.
If you are the author of similar research and have had your work copied by Mr. Gale without the proper attribution please let me know.
Mr. Gale: If you can show me evidence that you indeed possess a legitimate doctorate degree from an accredited university, I will gladly take this post down and issue you a very public apology. All I ask in return is an apology for misappropriating my work. I will let you keep it on your blog as long as you attribute the work properly to me.