ABSTRACT
The kind of field work as practised by S. W. Wooldridge is essentially British, and represents the trade-mark of much British geographical writing. Field work in American geography seems to have been identified much more with research than with teaching. Geographical field work in Britain came in the 1920’s and 1930’s to be dominated by the regional survey movement. An earlier manifestation of the regional survey movement sprang from summer meetings organized by Patrick Geddes in Edinburgh from 1887. Geographical field methods owe much to those of geology; in fact Wooldridge’s training as a field man was as a geologist. Although most commentary on field work in geography has been made by Wooldridge and G. E. Hutchings, it has also become fashionable to include references to the necessity for field work in the inaugural addresses by new occupants of chairs of geography.
