Since Wil Goudy served as Historian for the Rural Sociological Society (RSS), each year the RSS Historian has created a display for the Society’s annual conference featuring some aspect of the history of RSS or rural sociology. 

Beginning with the Historian’s display at the 2022 conference, I drew on my larger research project examining rural sociology’s historical engagement with race/ethnicity and racism and created a 3-poster display.  For the 2023 conference, the information provided in the display was expanded and a booklet was created so that individuals would have a resource to take home with them.  In 2024, a new display was designed providing additional resources and told the story of how linkages between rural sociologists and W.E.B. Du Bois were uncovered.

These webpages on the RSS Historian’s website are intended to increase access to the display posters, booklet, and provide online links to the many publications and resources included in the booklet.

Here you can find:

• the 2022 Display Posters;
• the Hidden History Booklet (2023);
• the 2024 Display Posters;
• References and Resources (with pdfs and online links).

As explained on the original display “Unearthing and piecing together a neglected and forgotten past is an unending project.  These posters only touch the tip of the iceberg of those left out of the collective history of rural sociology.  The hope is that this display is but one of many efforts to focus on recovering and re-emplacing these important voices, figures, and scholarship.”