The State of Vermont conveys to the average American a simple way or life ; a tamed but unspoiled rural landscape ; a healthy, balanced environment ; and a kind of sports park, green in summer, white in winter, on the edge of Megalopolis. These amenties have amalgamated to form a composite geographical image, one however, that contradicts the reality of the state. This distorted image, promoted by exaggerative publicity, is a reflection of a larger American search for bliss and stability in the countryside as a foil to the pressures or urban living and rapid social and economic change. Efforts within the state to fulfill the ideal suggest that the image has considerable power of transformation.