"Like the sun rising at midnight," Palmer later told Rod.
In 1937, the Rural Electrification Administration cooperative reached Benson County, North Dakota. Palmer Stadum, then 28 years old, was among the crew workers who installed the power lines that brought electricity to farms across the county — farms that had operated entirely by kerosene lamp, hand pump, and muscle.
Palmer worked for Baker Electric, the cooperative that organized and carried out the installation. The work was physical and deliberate: setting poles, stringing wire, connecting farmsteads one by one to the new electrical grid.
Decades later, Palmer would tell Rod that the moment a farmhouse lit up for the first time was unlike anything else — "like the sun rising at midnight." That phrase, recorded by Scott in a 2019 conversation with Rod, is one of the archive's most vivid primary sources.
The event was formally documented when the REA held its 40th Anniversary in 1975, and Palmer's participation was recognized at the Rugby Pioneer Village museum — the same recognition that drew Rod and Palmer together to the event as a family.