Think of a place that is special to you.
Is it the kitchen where your grandmother made the world’s best sweet potato pie and biscuits? Or the lake you used to swim in with your cousins? The football stadium where you cheered (or cried) with friends?
I’ve been thinking about special places in South Carolina a lot lately. How they make us feel, the people attached to them, the memories they invoke, and the unique history they represent. These are what make a place more than just a physical space.
According to the influential cartographer Waldo Tobler, the first law of geography is that “Everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related to each other than distant things.”
I believe that applies to more than just geography. I believe it applies to people. The nearer I am to you, the more we’re connected and the more we’re related. I also believe your special places are in some way connected to mine, whether through proximity or a shared history, a common experience, or a familiar appreciation for nature.
These connections are what fuel our mutual love for South Carolina. And they are part of what drives the electric cooperatives’ desire to serve their members.
The corporate executives and Wall Street shareholders of investor-owned utilities think about miles of line and how many more customers they can sell power to. They don’t see places; they see spaces based on the profit potential that exists within them.
Electric cooperatives serve special places with a focus on the people who make those places unique. Through their lines, co-ops connect an ancestral home overlooking a river to a park where children play out their sports fantasies to the local meat-and-three that serves great made-from-scratch vegetables, biscuits and cornbread. These places matter to co-ops because our co-op board members and employees live and work in those communities. They have their own special places there, too.
When South Carolina’s electric co-ops first formed 85 years ago, it was because the people in rural communities knew electricity would benefit the places they love—people like Henry McNeill and the good folks of Spring Branch, whose story we told in this column last year. They cared so much about their corner of Horry County that they brought out their mules and post-hole diggers to help Horry Electric Cooperative erect the poles that would finally bring power to their homes. When co-ops support local businesses, charities and community initiatives, they do so because their mission is to improve the lives of the people and places they serve.
In last month’s “Dialogue,” we visited Sam McMillan, the retired Blue Ridge Electric employee whose home is in the Oconee County community of Madison. Sam’s special place is the barn porch, where he can reflect on his Scottish ancestors who farmed the land before him, the memories of his children playing in that valley, and the day’s work in his garden. We could relate to Sam’s love for his home and his passion for the people of Madison, the bond to his ancestors and his connection to the land.
In upcoming issues, we’ll visit more special places and people around our state. We’ll learn about how their history has shaped communities and co-op members.
I hope that telling their stories will draw us nearer to one another and deepen our connections as South Carolinians.