Cooperative Living October 2017 - 4

Viewpoint | by Richard G. Johnstone Jr., Executive Editor
ISSN 1529-4579
RICHARD G. JOHNSTONE JR.
Executive Editor
BILL SHERROD
Editor
LAURA EMERY
Field Editor
JANET BAILEY
Production Manager
LAURIE MILLS,
Apple Eye Studio, LLC
Graphic Designer
AMANDA S. CUNNINGHAM
Advertising Sales
TOMMY CAMPBELL
Design & E-Media Specialist
To contact magazine:
9 a.m.-5 p.m. M-F
Phone: (804) 346-3344
Or at any time:
Fax: (804) 346-3448
Email: bsherrod@vmdaec.com
Web: www.co-opliving.com
Published by the VA, MD & DE Association
of Electric Cooperatives
JAMES E. HUFFMAN
Chairman
HERBERT R. PATRICK
Vice Chairman
FLETCHER B. JONES
Secretary/Treasurer
RICHARD G. JOHNSTONE JR.
President & CEO
Board of Directors: R. Wayne Browning, Belvin Williamson, Jr.,
A&N; C. Michael Sandridge, Michael J. Keyser, BARC; George N.
Goin, Gary E. Wood, Central Virginia; Robert E. Arnold, Michael
I. Wheatley, Choptank; Jeannette S. Everett, Steven A. Harmon,
Community; James E. Huffman, Shawn C. Hildebrand, CraigBotetourt;
Patricia S. Dorey, J. William Andrew, Delaware;
Fletcher B. Jones, John C. Lee, Jr., Mecklenburg; Russell G.
Brown, Greg W. White, Northern Neck; Wade C. House, Stan C.
Feuerberg, Northern Virginia; Dale McNiel, Randell W. Meyers,
Powell Valley; Herbert R. Patrick, Micheal E. Malandro, Prince
George; Linda R. Gray, Kent D. Farmer, Rappahannock; Larry C.
Howdyshell, Michael W. Hastings, Shenandoah Valley; Frank W.
Bacon, Jeffrey S. Edwards, Southside.
During October we celebrate the power of cooperation,
whether gathering in the harvest or distributing electricity
across the countryside.
Come, ye thankful people, come;
Raise the song of Harvest-home;
All is safely gathered in,
ere the winter storms begin.
- Henry Alford, 19th-century
English theologian
.
A
h, October! A month both bitter ... and
sweet. Poignant ... and exhilarating.
There's the invigorating uplift to body
To advertise in Cooperative Living, contact:
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National Advertising Representative: NCM,
611 South Congress Ave., Suite 504,
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PRESSRUN . . . . . . . . . 522,547
COOPERATIVE LIVING (USPS 473-300) is
published 10 times a year, monthly except for
combined March/April and November/ December
issues, by the Va., Md. & Del. Association of Electric
Cooperatives. POSTMASTER, address changes
should be sent to: Cooperative Living, 4201
Dominion Boulevard, Suite 101, Glen Allen, VA
23060, (804) 346-3344. Periodicals Postage paid at
Glen Allen, VA, and additional mailing offices.
Subscription: $4.99 per year for members of
subscribing co-ops; $10 per year for all others.
ADVERTISING published is accepted on the
premise that the merchandise and services offered
are accurately described and willingly sold to
customers at the advertised price. Neither this
magazine nor the electric cooperatives in Virginia,
Maryland, and Delaware endorses any products or
services advertised herein. If any readers encounter
non-compliance with these standards, they are
asked to inform the Editor.
and soul from its balmy, blue-sky days and its
crisp, starry nights. But there's also the aching
beauty that foreshadows decline: trees ablaze
in a final curtain-call, summer birds taking wing
to far-off lands.
There's the crunch of tart apples announcing
another growing season done. And there's the
enveloping tang of wood smoke, warming us
while warning of winter on-the-way.
Humankind for millennia has moved in
motion with nature's rhythms and heeded
nature's call, every autumn gathering in the
harvest and firming up the foundations ahead
of the relentless approach of winter.
The harvest has been celebrated in song and
story for centuries, in part because it involves
gathering the food that sustains us, but also
because this gathering generally involves the
labor of many hands. Many cooperative hands.
The harvest embodies both how, and why,
cooperatives work: everyone shares in - and
benefits from - the effort. So it's only natural
that for decades October has been celebrated
as Cooperative Month.
Cooperatives are a strong but often silent
presence in our lives, meeting needs as diverse
as banking and babysitting, food and housing,
commodities and communications, and, of
course, electricity.
Your electric cooperative is one of over 900
spread across 47 American states, each one
locally owned, locally controlled, and dedicated
to providing its member-owners with the best
possible service at the lowest possible cost, every
minute of every day.
As we've discussed in these pages many times
over many years, each cooperative is unique, and
yet each is united with all the others by a shared
commitment to seven cooperative principles.
2
These seven principles outline how
cooperatives operate, with:
* voluntary and open membership;
* democratic member control;
* economic participation by the members;
* autonomy and independence;
* a commitment to member education
and information;
* cooperation among cooperatives; and
* concern for community.
Like a farmer distilling sugar water into
maple syrup, the first six principles are boiled
down to the pure essence of a cooperative
in the seventh principle, concern for
community. Working hard every day to improve
the quality of life for members is what
cooperatives are all about.
In the 1930s, improving the quality of life
for rural America meant lighting the landscape,
at a time when only one in 10 farms had central
station electricity. So hundreds of cooperatives
sprang up to serve every corner
of our vast land, and by the mid-'50s, virtually
everyone had service.
The result of magic? Hardly.
Sweat, not sorcery, built this remarkable
network. Many hands joined together in the
1930s and '40s - farmers and ranchers,
merchants and teachers, rural people all -
and worked together in small towns and
country crossroads throughout the land
to provide themselves with power, when
the big electric utilities of the time were
unwilling to do so.
The cooperative principle of member
ownership proved a perfect fit for this
undertaking, which was broad in scale, deep
in involvement. And the not-for-profit business
structure made a valuable service as affordable
as possible for the rural people of the time,
and for today's member-owners as well.
So whether to harvest the land's bounty
or deliver power to its people, cooperation
is something worth celebrating. As 19thcentury
theologian Henry Alford implored,
" Come, ye thankful people, come; raise the
song of Harvest-home " ! 
www.co-opliving.com
Raise the Song!
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Cooperative Living October 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Cooperative Living October 2017
