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History
Broad River Electric Cooperative has its roots in the need for electric energy. Upstate farmers, like their neighbors in town, had long wanted electric service, but until the late 1930s few could get it. In many cases, rural people lived close to an existing power line, but privately owned utilities refused to extend service to them.
With the Rural Electrification Act, things changed.
Working together, farmers in the Upstate formed Broad River Electric Cooperative, incorporating it in June 1940 with G. G. Inman as the Co-op's first president.
Though progress was terribly slow, it was progress nonetheless. On October 7, 1941, Co-op linemen energized lines from a substation near the Philadelphia Church, outside Gaffney. Co-op Member-Owners living along the Gaffney-Pacolet Road were the first to benefit.
Inman, whose title became superintendent, then manager, ran the Co-op through the difficult years of World War II with the help of two young women in the office and one lineman. After those lean years, the Co-op underwent a hectic post-war expansion.
We still are expanding today. With 2,348 miles of line, Broad River Electric now serves more than 17,000 rural and suburban residents in Cherokee, Spartanburg, Newberry, and Union counties in South Carolina, as well as Cleveland, Polk, and Rutherfordton counties in North Carolina.
Though we've evolved with the times, our essential character remains the same: we're a locally owned, democratically operated company that conducts business with the public good in mind. This commitment to community, coupled with other long-time Co-op values such as integrity, innovation, and accountability, led us to join other like-minded electric cooperatives around the nation in the Touchstone Energy alliance.
The Touchstone Energy slogan, "The Power of Human Connections," reflects our commitment to bringing our Member-Owners reliable, affordable energy and other services.
As the electric industry faces the changes and challenges of a new millennium, the cooperative spirit lives on at Broad River Electric Cooperative.
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