In the 1930s, only one farm in ten had electricity before President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the Rural Electrification Administration to bring rural America out of the darkness. FDR’s partners were the nation’s electric cooperatives. From humble beginnings, electric co-ops developed into one of the most formidable lobbying organizations in the United States.
Power Plays explores the defining moments in the relationship between electric co-ops and the U.S. presidency—a history that intersects with some of the most important events of the last seventy-five years: FDR’s infamous “purge” of dissident Democrats, the classic 1948 Truman-Dewey presidential campaign, JFK’s Cuban Missile Crisis, the Vietnam War, Nixon’s Watergate scandal, and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Ted Case takes readers inside the White House to give the stories of twelve presidents and the four electric co-op leaders who built the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association into a major force on the American political scene: Clyde Ellis, Robert Partridge, Bob Bergland, and Glenn English.
A fast-paced, behind-the-scenes story about political strength, political survival, and epic legislative battles, Power Plays is an essential read for those interested in the past—and future—of electric co-ops.