Diverse Power Incorporated commemorates its 75th anniversary this year with a book chronicling the electric cooperative’s history.

“Diverse Power: From Light Bulbs to Laptops, Building the Electric Co-op” tracks the LaGrange-based co-op’s history from its pre-electric past to its formation in 1936 to its current status as a 90-employee electric membership corporation providing electricity and related services to 23,000 members in seven counties.

The 240-page hardcover volume was written by Jackie Kennedy, a LaGrange-based freelance writer who has produced articles for Diverse Power’s monthly newsletter since 1994. “Diverse Power’s corporate history is the finest I’ve ever seen,” says Troup County Historian Clark Johnson. “It is perfectly written, entertaining and interesting, and beautifully arranged and illustrated. It not only is a good business history and organizational record—it’s an important piece of Troup County and West Georgia history that perfectly ties everything together with national events.”

The book explores the local cooperative’s connections with the origin of widespread rural electricity, which got underway after President Franklin D. Roosevelt enacted the Rural Electrification Administration in 1935. The president, who lived part-time in Georgia at his Little White House in Warm Springs, became well acquainted with the need for rural electricity while visiting with farmers and neighbors in Meriwether and Troup counties, which subsequently became part of Diverse Power’s service territory.



“Rural electrification and Diverse Power’s stories are truly important parts of our national and local history,” says Diverse Power President/CEO Wayne Livingston. “Our 75th anniversary serves as an opportunity for us to reflect over the events, people and organizations that made us what we are today.”

“From Light Bulbs to Laptops” is available for purchase in LaGrange at Diverse Power headquarters at 1400 South Davis Road, Troup County Archives at Legacy Museum on Main, and the LaGrange-Troup County Chamber of Commerce on Bull Street. The book, which retails for $34.95, will be available for a limited time for $25.

For each book sold at Troup County Archives, Diverse Power will donate $5 to the Troup County Historical Society, and for those sold at the Chamber of Commerce, $5 per book goes to support projects of the Chamber.

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