The papers of Jacob Crane, consisting of seven project files, give only brief vignettes of a long career in planning and relate chiefly to Crane's work as a consultant. While still in the federal civil service as assistant to the Administrator of Housing and Home Finance Agency in international affairs, he served as consultant to Puerto Rico and to the United Nations Department of Social Affairs. His consulting work represented in his papers includes studies in housing, new towns, a master plan, urban renewal, and rehabilitation studies. Also worth noting is Crane's 1933 Iowa Twenty-Year Conservation Plan, an early example of state planning, a printed copy of which is in Mann Library.

Crane was acquainted with Constantine Doxiadis and became a senior consultant for Doxiadis Associates, an international firm, in 1955. There is correspondence with Doxiadis under two projects--Greece and Ponca City, Oklahoma--which contains an interested memorandum outlining Doxiadis' procedure for a study.

The collection is divided into seven subject files, arranged chronologically by the commencement date of the project. The material is largely correspondence, accounts revealing the locale and duration of employ, drafts and reports, and some working and reference papers such as maps, charts, legislation, etc.

There is a small quantity of printed material by Crane, transferred from other collections.