Patrick Geddes

(b Ballater, Perthshire, 2 Oct 1854; d Montpellier, France, 17 April 1931). Scottish scientist, urban planner, teacher and writer. He studied in London (1874-8) under the natural scientist Thomas Huxley and from 1878 at the University of Paris. In France he was introduced to the social theories of Frederic Le Play (1806-82) and Elis?e Reclus (1830-1905), which shaped his future work decisively. After extensive travels in Europe and South America, Geddes returned to Edinburgh in 1880. From 1889 to 1919 he held the chair of Botany at Dundee University, while working mostly in Edinburgh. He quickly established a reputation as a radical and unconventional thinker. His basic concern was social change and the relationship between society and its environment, which for Geddes were inextricably linked. In his view, only the interaction of social processes and spatial form could bring about social change. Thus he developed the idea of 'civics', the study of social and environmental planning, and he initiated the Edinburgh summer meetings (1887-99), annual summer schools covering a wide range of subjects and promoting the study of civics, sociology and geography.

See the Abbreviations for further details.

The Scottish sociologist, biologist, educator, and town planner Sir Patrick Geddes (1854-1932) is famous for his concepts and achievements in town planning.

Patrick Geddes, born in Ballater on Oct. 2, 1854, was brought up near Perth. Through boyhood explorations of Perthshire and the Highlands, Patrick learned to see rural and urban life as a whole and began to study all living things, including man, in relation to their environment. He graduated from Perth Academy at 16.

After an 18-month apprenticeship in a local bank, Geddes began studies of chemistry, geology, and biology, along with drawing and cabinetmaking. At 20, however, he found his real goal - zoology under T. H. Huxley. Then, while on an expedition to Mexico, a crisis of temporary blindness turned him from "eye-minded" extrovert into philosophical classifier of sciences and inventor of graphic "thinking machines" from folded sheets of paper. Thus arose his combination of Auguste Comte's sociology with Frédéric Le Play's occupational economics of Place-Work-Family into his own graphic double-action formula of Place*Work*Folk::Folk*Work*Place.

Returning to Scotland in April 1880 with weakened eyes which thereafter kept him from the microscope, Geddes became an inspiring lecturer in botany at Edinburgh University and carried on an incredibly varied intellectual and practical life. He urged the application of energy and biology concepts to statistics and economics; lectured on cooperation and socialism, capital, and labor; and campaigned for university extension and other educational reforms.

In 1886 Geddes married Anna Morton, a gifted musician, and they founded the Edinburgh Social Union. Moving into a workers' tenement, they cleaned up by example and personal labor many of the worst slum dwellings along the Royal Mile.

Accepting a part-time professorship in botany at University College, Dundee, in 1888 (held until 1919), Geddes organized the first summer schools in Europe at Edinburgh (1887-1898) and founded the Outlook Tower (1892) as "the world's first sociological laboratory." Here also came into focus his town planning concepts of civic and regional survey, or "diagnosis before treatment," and of "conservative surgery" instead of wholesale destruction of slum areas. Though biology was being crowded into the background, Geddes did publish the milestone Evolution of Sex (1889), in collaboration with his later-famous pupil, J. Arthur Thomson.

In 1897 Geddes and his wife went to Cyprus as private "economic missionaries," reclaiming arid farmlands and starting rural industries as realistic answers to the unsolved "Eastern question" of blundering colonial politicians. In 1899 and 1900 he made lecture tours of the United States, organizing meanwhile the American Section of the International School at the Paris Exposition of 1900. In Paris he launched a bold plan for preserving the best national pavilions of the "Rue des Nations" as permanent international museums and institutes - a UNESCO nearly 50 years ahead of its time! Impossible of realization then, the project has since been termed the greatest of Geddes's "magnificent failures." Another of these was his epoch-making survey of Dunfermline in 1903-1904 for the Scottish trustees of Andrew Carnegie's $2,500,000 gift to his birthplace. Rejected by them but published at Geddes's own expense, the resulting Study in City Development is today a classic of Geddesian thought and planning methods.

The decade 1914-1924 took Geddes to India and Palestine. He made diagnosis-and-treatment surveys of some 50 Indian urban areas. Among these his 2-volume Town Planning towards City Development for Indore in 1918 vies with his 1915 classic, Cities in Evolution, in awakening citizens as well as planners to the practical significance of his P*W*F::F*W*P formula. Both works are seasoned with neologisms coined to express new concepts, such as "paleotechnics," "neotechnics," "biotechnics," "conurbation," "megalopolis," "kakatopia," and "eutopia."

In 1919 he gave his farewell address at Dundee, then accepted the chair of sociology and civics at the University of Bombay. Returning to India via Jerusalem, he there made city plans for the military governor and designed a university for the Zionists which, had they built it, would have given the world a model of interdisciplinary and interfaith higher education that might well have provided solutions to age-old Arab-Jewish-Christian conflicts.

In 1924 serious illness forced Geddes's return to Europe, but on reaching southern France he made a remarkable recovery and was soon building a small-scale Outlook Tower and University Hall near Montpellier. In 1925 he could thus open his final project, the Scots College, as the first unit of a Mediterranean "Cité Universitaire." The New Year's Honors of 1932 listed Geddes as Sir Patrick for his services to education. He died in Montpellier on April 17, 1932.

Further Reading

The most recent book on Geddes is Philip Mairet, Pioneer of Sociology: The Life and Letters of Patrick Geddes (1957). Philip Boardman, Patrick Geddes: Maker of the Future (1944), contains some semifictional material now being weeded out for a revised edition. The first book on Geddes, Amelia Defries's The Interpreter Geddes: The Man and His Gospel (1927), is rather disorganized but contains authentic transcriptions of some of his "teaching talks." Another important document is Lewis Mumford's evaluation of Geddes in The Condition of Man (1944).

Additional Sources

Boardman, Philip, The worlds of Patrick Geddes: biologist, town planner, re-educator, peace-warrior, London; Boston: Routledge and K. Paul, 1978.

Kitchen, Paddy, A most unsettling person: the life and ideas of Patrick Geddes, founding father of city planning and environmentalism, New York: Saturday Review Press, 1975.

Mairet, Philip, Pioneer of sociology: the life and letters of Patrick Geddes, Westport, Ct.: Hyperion Press, 1979.

Meller, Helen Elizabeth, Patrick Geddes: social evolutionist and city planner, London; New York: Routledge, 1990.

Meller, Helen Elizabeth, Patrick Geddes: social evolutionist and city planner, London; New York: Routledge, 1993.

Patrick Geddes: a symposium, 1 March 1982, Dundee: Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art: University of Dundee, 1982.

Scots town-planning theorist. He gave emphasis to preliminary surveys and analysis (including sociological research) before any action should be taken. His study of Dunfermline, described by Abercrombie as the first town-planning report ever undertaken, was published as City Development (1904). He organized a huge ‘Cities and Town-Planning Exhibition’ in London (1910) that was influential, and later he prepared numerous reports on cities in India. His designs included the first hall of residence for students at Edinburgh University (1892) and the Outlook Tower (1895) in the same city.

Bibliography

• Boardman (1978)
• P. Geddes (1918, 1973)
• LeG & Sturgis (1996)
• Meller(1990)
• Tyrwhitt (ed.) (1947)

The full bibliography for this book is available to download as a pdf file.
Download the bibliography for A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (PDF: 1.2MB)

Quotes:

"We will get everything out of her that you can squeeze out of a lemon and a bit more. I will squeeze her until you can hear the pips squeak."

Patrick Geddes
Patrick Geddes circa 1886
Born	October 2, 1854 Ballater, Aberdeenshire, Scotland
Died	1932
Nationality	Scottish
Known for	Conurbation

Sir Patrick Geddes (October 2, 1854 - 1932) was a Scottish biologist, known also for his innovative thinking in the fields of urban planning and education. He was responsible for introducing the concept of "region" to architecture and planning and is also known to have coined the term "conurbation"^[1] .

Contents 1 Biography 2 Urban planning 3 Published works 4 References 5 Bibliography 6 See also 7 External links

Biography

Patrick Geddes was born in Ballater, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. He studied at the Royal College of Mines in London under Thomas Henry Huxley between 1874 and 1878, and lectured in Zoology at Edinburgh University from 1880 to 1888. He held the Chair of Botany at University College Dundee from 1888 to 1919, and the Chair of Sociology at the University of Bombay from 1919 to 1924. He died in Montpellier, France on April 17, 1932. He was knighted in 1932 shortly before his death.

Urban planning

Geddes shared the belief with Alejandro Reinosa that social processes and spatial form are related. Therefore, by changing the spatial form it was possible to change the social structure as well. This was particularly important in the late 19th and early 20th century when industrialization was dramatically altering the conditions of life.

Geddes demonstrated this theory through his work in Edinburgh's Old Town. Here, in this most dilapidated area, he used associations with prominent thinkers who lived there in the 18th and 19th century (like Adam Smith), to establish residential halls. The building in question is still part of the University of Edinburgh complex. Here he situated his famous Outlook Tower, a museum of local, regional, Scottish, and world history.

He collaborated with his son-in-law, architect Sir Frank Mears on projects in the Middle East. In 1919, Geddes was commissioned by the British Mandate to draw up a masterplan for Jerusalem. ^[2]In 1925, he submitted a master plan for Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv is the only known city whose core is entirely built according to Geddes' plan.

Geddes was the founder of the College Des Ecossais, an international teaching establishment located in Montpellier, France. In India, Geddes provided planning consultancy to the rulers of Princely states. His principles for town planning in Bombay included: ("What town planning means under the Bombay Town Planning Act of 1915")^[3]

• Preservation of human life and energy, rather than superficial beautification.
• Conformity to an orderly development plan carried out in stages.
• Purchasing land suitable for building.
• Promoting trade and commerce.
• Preserving historic buildings and buildings of religious significance.
• Developing a city worthy of civic pride, not an imitation of European cities.
• Promoting the happiness, health and comfort of all residents, rather than focusing on roads and parks available only to the rich.
• Control over future growth with adequate provision for future requirements.

In Madras, Geddes worked with Lord Pentland, whom he knew from Edinburgh. Pentland invited Geddes to hold an exhibit on town planning in 1914. This was around the time of the meeting of the Indian National Congress and Pentland hoped the exhibit would demonstrate the benefits of British rule. The materials for the exhibit were sent to India on a ship that was sunk near Madras by the German ship Emden. New material was collected and exhibited at the Senate hall of Madras University in 1915. Geddes lectured and worked with Indian surveyors and traveled to Bombay and Bengal where Pentland's political allies Lords Willingdon and Carmichael were governors. He held a position in Sociology and Civics at Bombay University from 1919 to 1925.^[3]

Geddes was keenly interested in the science of ecology, an advocate of nature conservation and strongly opposed to pollution. Because of this, some historians have claimed he was a forerunner of modern Green politics.^[4]

Geddes' ideas had a worldwide circulation: his most famous admirer was the American urban theorist Lewis Mumford. Geddes also influenced several British urban planners (notably Raymond Unwin), the Indian social scientist Radhakamal Mukerjee and the Catalan architect Cebrià de Montoliu (1873-1923) as well as many other 20th century thinkers.^[5]

Published works

• City Development, A Report to the Carnegie Dunfermline Trust (1904), Rutgers University Press
• Cities in Evolution (1915) Williams & Norgate
• The life and work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose (1920) Longmans London

References

1. ^ * CASA News: Patrick Geddes and the Digital Age
2. ^ An Empire in the Holy Land: Historical Geography of the British Administration in Palestine, 1917-1929 Gideon Biger, St. Martin's Press, New York & Magnes Press, Jerusalem, p. 216.
3. ^ ^{a b} Robert Home (1997) Of Planting and Planning: The making of British colonial cities E & FN Spon. ISBN 0-203-44961-4
4. ^ See Modern Environmentalism: An Introduction by David Pepper, Routledge, 1996, and Environmentalism: A Global History (pgs. 59-62) by Ramachandra Guha, Longman, 1999.
5. ^ For Geddes' influence on these thinkers,see Patrick Geddes: Social Evolutionist and City Planner by Helen Meller Routledge, 1993, and Varieties of Environmentalism: Essays North and South by Guha and Juan Martínez Alier,Earthscan Publications, 1997

Bibliography

• Renwick, Chris; Gunn Richard C (2008). "Demythologizing the machine: Patrick Geddes, Lewis Mumford, and classical sociological theory". Journal of the history of the behavioral sciences (United States) 44 (1): 59-76. doi:10.1002/jhbs.20282. ISSN 0022-5061. PMID 18196543. 
• Renwick, Chris (Mar. 2009). "The practice of Spencerian science: Patrick Geddes's Biosocial Program, 1876-1889". Isis; an international review devoted to the history of science and its cultural influences (United States) 100 (1): 36-57. ISSN 0021-1753. PMID 19554869. 
• The Interpreter Geddes: The Man and His Gospel (1927) Amelia Defries,
• Patrick Geddes: Maker of the Future (1944) Philip Boardman
• Pioneer of Sociology: The Life and Letters of Patrick Geddes (1957) Philip Mairet
• A Most Unsettling Person (1975) Paddy Kitchen
• The Worlds of Patrick Geddes: Biologist, Town Planner, Re-educator, Peace-warrior (1978) Philip Boardman
• Patrick Geddes: Social Evolutionist and City Planner (1990) Helen Meller
• Biopolis, Patrick Geddes and the City of Life (2002) Volker M. Welter
• L'Atlas de Tel-Aviv (2008) Catherine Weill-Rochant
• 'Evaluer la pérennité urbaine : l’exemple du plan Geddes pour Tel-Aviv', Pérennité urbaine, ou la ville par-delà ses métamorphose, C. Vallat, A. Le Blanc, Pascale Philifert (coord.) Volume I : Traces, Paris, L’Harmattan, 2009, p. 315-325.

See also

• Scottish Renaissance
• Geddes Island

External links

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Patrick Geddes

• The online Journal of Civics & Generalism, is an international collaborative project with extensive essays and graphic material inspired by the work of Patrick Geddes in a modern context
• Geddes as a pioneer landscape architect
• The Geddes Institute at Dundee University, Scotland
• Works by Patrick Geddes at Project Gutenberg
• Sir Patrick Geddes Memorial Trust

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