"It's Coming For You" (Association of Electric Cooperatives, c. 1937)
Thesis
(Cooperative Connections, Nov. 2019, Vol. 20, No. 7)
In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Rural Electrification Administration (REA) that, by the flip of a switch, lit up the rural frontier. After being rejected by private utilities, the REA's low-cost loan provision prompted establishment of rural electric cooperatives, which provided affordable, reliable, rural electric access that sparked economic and cultural transformation, and created a key conduit for continued rural vitality through focusing on people, communities, and energy innovation.
"Rural Electrification Administration co-op office. Lafayette, Louisiana. 1939" (Sakaer, National Archives)
"Rural Electrification Admin. (REA): lineman working on pole as farmer watches." (FDR Presidential Library and Museum, 1936)
"Rural electric co-ops probably caused the biggest cultural [transformation] in the history of rural America because it just so totally changed lives."
-Orion Samuelson, Hall of Fame Agricultural Broadcaster (Illinois State Museum Society Interview, 2 Feb. 2009)