Series I primarily consists of correspondence pertaining to Castle's research and editorial work and relates to foundation grant funding, requests for reviews of articles and books, and involvement in professional organizations and conferences. This series also documents Castle's work in Resources For the Future and Winrock International. Series II contains correspondence, memoranda, reports, testimony and research proposals from University committees served on by Castle. Included among the issues addressed by these committees are foundation grants for research projects, Oregon land use legislation, the administrative placement of the OSU Extension Service Program, and water resources research projects.
Series III consists of reviews written by Castle of books related to natural resources and agriculture. Series IV are speeches, lectures, and testimony Castle presented at professional conferences, universities, and the U.S. Congress. The topics addressed in these presentations include: water resources, the global agricultural economy, the future of American agriculture, government involvement in agricultural markets, and think tanks.
Series V consists of reports and studies covering the years 1976 to 1995 and pertaining to university agricultural and extension service programs, administrative costs at OSU, and public expectations of higher education. Included in this series are the draft and final reports of the Extension Education Transition Committee, a body headed by Castle which examined the OSU Extension Service and offered recommendations concerning its administrative reorganization and placement. Series VI consists of journal articles, Extension publications, and books written and edited by Castle. Series VII is an editor's copy of a book, The Changing American Countryside: Rural People and Places, edited by Castle in 1994-1995. Notes on small post-its on the edge of pages in the manuscript pertain to needed additions and changes to maps and figures in the book.
An addition to the Castle Papers (Accession 2012:007) is made up of article reprints, certificates, conference papers, correspondence, meeting minutes, photographs, a plaque, reports, and speeches. Documenting Castle's research and publication activities as a professor of Economics, these materials also reflect presentations Castle made to various groups, peer reviews of research, organizational involvement, consultancy projects for other universities, honors received, and his administrative work at OSU. In economics, Castle's foci of interest were natural resource use and rural development. Interwoven into Castle's writings on rural development are topics addressing land use policies, water resources, and environmental protection. In addition to the National Rural Studies Committee in which Castle chaired while at OSU, other organizations represented in these records include the American Agricultural Economics Association, Western Rural Development Center, and the Resources For the Future, Inc (RFF). Castle worked for RFF for 10 years (1976-1986) before returning to campus to chair the University Graduate Faculty of Economics. Numbering 15 prints in total, the photographs are mostly portrait shots of Castle.
