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The Lane County Survey: An Episode in the Development of Rural Planning

One of the major social concerns at the turn of the twentieth century—how best to cope with massive urbanization and industrialization—stimulated the rise of modern American urban and regional planning. Most of those active in the nascent field of planning directed their efforts toward the receiving end of the population shift, the cities. But the changes in rural places, and especially the meaning of rural change for society as a whole, also received much attention. A variety of activities sprang up in the 1910s and '20s in an effort to strengthen rural institutions. In this article I focus on one category of those activities, the rural survey. The surveys are an important precursor to current approaches to rural socio-economic development planning: they highlight the key roles that culture and community play in the development process.

I first describe the perceived situation in rural America at the turn of the century. Next I discuss the development of the rural survey as a method to diagnose rural problems. I then examine one example of a rural survey, that done in Lane County, Oregon, in 1915 and '16. Finally, I consider the legacy of rural surveys—their impact on the development of planning for rural areas.

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