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An American Story: The Legacy of Rural Electrification
Guest Column By: Steve Brame, President & CEO
President & CEO, Pennsylvania Rural Electric Association & Allegheny Electric Cooperative, Inc.
As America marks its 250th birthday, we’ll hear a great deal about the people, principles, and events that shaped this nation. That is fitting. Milestones give us a reason to look back, not simply out of nostalgia, but to better understand the responsibility we carry forward.
For those of us who serve rural electric cooperatives, that history has a special meaning.
The American story has always been closely tied to rural places. Long before there were highways, power lines, broadband connections, or modern farm equipment, the strength of the country depended on the people who worked the land, built communities, and embraced self-reliance. Thomas Jefferson, one of the nation’s Founding Fathers and the architect of the Declaration of Independence, once wrote that “cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens.”
That view reflected something we should not forget today: Rural America was not separate from the nation’s future. It was central to it.
And yet, for much of our history, rural communities were too often asked to wait for progress. In the 1930s, while many cities and towns were being transformed by electricity, millions of farms and rural homes remained in the dark. Private utilities generally did not see the value of serving areas where homes were miles apart and the return on investment was uncertain.
Despite this, rural people did what they have done throughout American history: They organized and solved the problem together.
Rural electric cooperatives are also marking a milestone this year: the 90th anniversary of the Rural Electrification Act. With the signing of that legislation in 1936 and the determination of local citizens, electric cooperatives began bringing power to places that had been overlooked. Neighbors signed up neighbors. Communities set poles, strung lines, and built systems that changed daily life in ways that are hard to overstate. Electricity made farms more productive, homes safer, schools stronger, and small businesses more viable.
That was not just an energy story. It was an American story.
Rural electric cooperatives were built on the belief that essential service should not depend solely on geography or profit potential. They were built on local control, democratic governance, and responsibility to the people at the end of the line. Those principles are as relevant today as they were when the first co-op lines were energized.
At the Pennsylvania Rural Electric Association and Allegheny Electric Cooperative, Inc., we see that legacy every day. Our 14 member cooperatives serve communities that are essential to their states’ — and the nation’s — economy, food supply, workforce, and quality of life. We also know the challenges are different now. Reliability, affordability, energy policy, grid resilience, and new technologies all require careful decisions and steady leadership.
America’s 250th birthday is a reminder that the work of building this country has never belonged to just one generation. Each generation inherits a promise and a responsibility.
For electric cooperatives, that responsibility is clear: They were created to bring power where it was needed most. Today, we carry that mission forward by keeping rural New Jersey and Pennsylvania connected, resilient, and ready for the future.
