Overview
| Repository | Office of the City Secretary Dallas Municipal Archives 1500 Marilla Street, 5D South Dallas, Texas 75201 |
| Creator | Office of the Mayor |
| Title | The Bartholomew Plan |
| Dates | 1943-1957 |
| Quantity | 2 linear inches |
| Abstract | Typescript and manuscript memoranda and correspondence and printed materials. |
| Identification | 1998-004 |
| Language | Records are in English |
Scope and Content
Collection documents urban planning in Dallas, Texas, from 1943 to 1957. Urban planning is the discipline of land use planning, which explores several aspects of the built and social environments of municipalities and communities.
At the prompting of Mayor J. Woodall Rodgers, in June 1943, the Dallas City Council hired St. Louis, Missouri, city planner Harland Bartholomew to draft a new comprehensive master plan for Dallas. The finished plan was delivered in January 1945. Action on the plan was initiated in December, 1945 after voters approved $40 million worth of improvement bonds. Products included not only expanding Love Field, Dallas’ municipally-owned airport and the Garza-Little Elm Reservoir (renamed Lake Dallas and later, Lake Lewisville) but also the construction of Central Expressway (U.S. Highway 75), the Dallas Memorial Auditorium, and the Dallas Public Library central facility.
Besides quality-of-life matters, the Bartholomew Plan attempted to streamline government and augment the economic development capacity of Dallas. Bartholomew’s comprehensive plan for the city treated Dallas government as a “system of systems” needing structure and coordination. The plan also marked the first time the City of Dallas sought to comprehensively improve African American neighborhoods and housing.
The collection contains printed and typescript reports of the Bartholomew Plan and materials relating to its follow-up study chaired by D.A. Hulcy, president of the Dallas Chamber of Commerce and former president of the American Chambers of Commerce. Missing reports from the printed series were photocopied from originals located in other collections. Materials were originally part of the papers of L. B. Houston, Director of the Dallas Park and Recreation Department.
Organization
The collection is arranged chronologically.
Access
Permission to publish, reproduce, distribute, or use by any and all other current or future developed methods or procedures must be obtained in writing from the Dallas Municipal Archives. All rights are reserved and retained regardless of current or future development or laws that may apply to fair use standards.
Citation
The Bartholomew Plan, 1943-1957 (Box <x>, Folder <y>), Dallas Municipal Archives
Related Materials
Collection 2005-001—Forward Dallas!
Index Terms
City planning -- Texas -- Dallas
Dallas -- Texas -- History
Container List
| 1 | 1 | Your Dallas of Tomorrow, A Master Plan for a Greater Dallas, 1943 |
| | 2 | A Master Plan for Dallas, Texas; Report Number Seven, A System of Parks and Schools [two copies] and related correspondence, June 1944 |
| | 3 | The Economics of Central Expressway by Marshall E. Surratt, 1954 |
| | 4 | Hulcy Committee memoranda, correspondence, and notes, 1955-1957 |