66 UNION COUNTY PAST AND PRESENT  
Union County Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation was in-  
` corporated in June, 1937. It received from the REA an allocation \
` of $100,000. A second allocation of $155,000, for supplemental  
lines, was made in October, 1937, but subsequently was rescinded A
by the REA.
3 Because of an insuiiicient number of members along the lines T
proposed by the local organization, the Rural Electrification  
Administration, in January, 1938, declared the original project  
impractical. It sent Walker D. Brightwell as its representative to  
assist in developing a project that it could approve.  
In April, 1938, a revised project was approved; and three  
months later staking was begun. John R. Hardin was engaged as  
project superintendent. The construction of one hundred miles of 5
line was completed November 22, 1939, energized to serve 201 i
members of the corporation. The construction of an additional k
sixty-five miles of line, for 130 members, was approved by the  
REA, and $65,000 was allotted for these extensions.  
At the suggestion of the Rural Electriiication Administration, 2
the board of directors of the Union County Cooperative Corpora— I
O tion on May 13, 1939, agreed to consolidation with the organiza- E
tion in Henderson County, to effect more efficient operation. Six
months later the membership of the Union County corporation
ratified the articles of consolidation; and the Henderson—Union i
Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation supplanted the two L
county corporations December 1, 1939. T
By August 1, 1941, five hundred families in Union County were i ·
being served by the new lines. Main lines extended then from 1
Morganlield to Boxville to the Spencer neighborhood; from Box-  
ville to Waverly; from Boxville to Sturgis to Henshaw; and 1
from Morganfield to Uniontown, to Spring Grove, to the juncti-on  
of Highways 56 and 85. l
Among the honors that have come to Union County in recent Q
years has been the election of two of its farmers to the select Q
company of "Master Farmers." Membership in this national  
honorary organization is granted only for high achievement in
the field of agriculture. K
The first Union Countian to be thus singled out was Charles
Meacham, Jr., chosen in 1935. His record as a pioneer in the
breeding of lespedeza, his active membership in the Kentucky
Farm Bureau Federation, and his four years’ service as presi-
dem of the Kentucky Seed Improvement Association, which in- j