ABSTRACT
At the end of the Second World War much of rural England and Wales was still dominated by agriculture and agricultural production. Although the ‘new’ country men and women who were discussed in Chapter 6 were beginning to make up a substantial part of the population in some, especially southeastern areas, many rural counties remained firmly agricultural. Even in the southeast the new editions of the popular Little Guides series prepared between 1946-52 stressed the importance of agriculture in counties like Surrey and Sussex. In both books the persistence of agriculture as an employer and as a shaper of landscapes was given a central place. Of Sussex the Little Guide wrote:1
It cannot be denied, of course, that much of the coastal fringe has now lost whatever natural charm it possessed. . . . But when all is said, there remains the larger part of the county which is still unspoiled; and there is comfort in the fact that even Peacehaven is only a short walk from untouched downland.
