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An examination of 116 small communities in Central Illinois indicates that their ability to provide citizens with adequate goods and services is closely related to their ability to hold population. The outlook for firmness in growth of population, however, is not particularly optimistic, considering the size of some of these communities. If a community is fortuitously located near a large city, its prospects for growth are greatly enhanced. In this case, the community may lose its identity, however, and become a "bedroom' town. Distance from a larger community no longer seems to afford protection to local markets and thus makes it increasingly more difficult for small communities to offer a great variety of goods and services. Although there were marked similarities among these communities, some of them did not fit the pattern. Undoubtedly many factors such as community pride and entrepreneurial spirit account for these differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A sample of 77 clergymen and 136 lay leaders, all of them members of the Lutheran Church in America, was taken in northern Illinois. It was found that even in this relatively conservative denomination, clergy, tended to give more liberal responses than laity on a variety of social and political issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on professor Robert F. Winch, who has received four E.W. Burgess Award for his significant role in family research. The U.S. National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) honored Winch with the award at the 1968 Annual Meeting of the NCFR in New Orleans, Louisiana. Winch dedicated his career for the study of family sociology and is presently working as professor of sociology at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. The article also includes information on some of his important works on the sociology of marriage and the family.