Todd-Wadena Electric Co-Op

Todd-Wadena Electric Cooperative employees understand that our members are our reason for being here and that they deserve outstanding customer service – both in the field and in the office. Let us know if you need more information about any of our services.

Our Story

While the method of distributing electric power is fundamentally the same as when the first substation was energized in 1941, the industry itself has undergone immeasurable change. All the while, past and present directors and employees have delivered a steadfast record of safe, reliable, affordable electricity to Todd-Wadena members.

Next Greatest Thing Photo The drudgery of life before electricity is something most of us can only imagine. In Robert Caro’s biography of Lyndon Johnson, the endless cycle of labor is summed up like this: “Washing, canning, shearing, picking and sowing; and every day carrying water and wood and having to do it all by hand because there was no electricity.”

It’s no wonder that President Roosevelt declared, “The farmer above all should have that power, on reasonable terms, for cheap transportation, for lighting their homes and for innumerable uses in the daily tasks on the farm.” By May of 1935 the Rural Electrification Act (REA) was ordered under Roosevelt authorizing federal assistance to rural America for the purpose of electrification.

About 90 percent of farms across the United States were without electricity at the time. Raising PoleConstruction tools and methods for extending power were primitive by today’s standards. It was an assembly-line process, where two men would first measure pole spacings and drive stakes where holes were to be dug. They’d move along to the next point, followed by a truck that would drop off poles, wires, insulators and transformers. Post hole diggers dug the holes by hand and a crew with pike poles arrived to set the poles in place. Conductors were strung, transformers hung and line was prepared for service.
The moment “the electric” lit up a farm was not to be missed. The first general manager of the National Rural Electric Association, Clyde T. Ellis, said it this way: “I wanted to be at my parent’s house when electricity came. It was 1940. We’d go around flipping the switch, to make sure it hadn’t come on yet. When it finally came on, the lights just barely glowed. I remember my mother smiling. When they came on full, tears started to run down her cheeks.” It was the people that made it all happen. They truly brought and built something to and for themselves. Working together, electric cooperatives became working symbols of what we’re all capable of achieving under democratic, cooperative principles.