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GVEC Eckols, Lewis - March 11, 1987

Interview with Lewis Eckols

Interviewer: Karen Yancy

Transcriber: Karen Yancy

Date of Interview: March 11, 1987

Location: Mr. Eckols’s Office at Guadalupe Valley Electric Cooperative, Gonzales, TX

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Begin Tape 1, Side 1

Karen Yancy: This is Karen Yancy. Today is March 11, 1987, and I’m conducting an oral interview with Mr. Lewis Eckols, manager of the electric operations division of Guadalupe Valley Electric Cooperative [GVEC] at Gonzales, Texas.

What year did you begin working for GVEC and in what position?

Eckols: I began work for GVEC on June 16, 1947, as a rodman on the survey crew.

Yancy: What promotions have you received, and how did your job change as a result of these promotions?

Eckols: Well, I was one of those that took every opportunity, so I had lots of jobs in those younger days. I was not on the survey crew very long, and I went into the engineering office. I was a draftsman for a short period of time. I was also a work order clerk for a short period of time, and then I was offered the job of warehouseman. We had not had a warehouseman or any method of material control at the time. Mr. Hausmann, the manager at that time, offered me this job in the warehouse, and I took it. In 1953, when Mr. Davis took over as manager, they offered me the job of engineering superintendent. I was in charge of the engineering department of the Co-op from 1953 to 1969. Then we had a reorganization, and I was appointed the electric system division manager, and I’ve had that job ever since.

Yancy: What experience did you bring to GVEC?

Eckols: I was only nineteen years old; in fact, I was eighteen, only six days away from being nineteen years of age. I had gone to college one semester and started back to college and decided to come home and go to work and get married.

Yancy: What are your responsibilities as manager of electric operations?

Eckols: At the present time, we have all the operations, maintenance and construction out of the Gonzales office for the Gonzales area. We are also in charge of the material department and the transportation department.

Yancy: What are the responsibilities of the departments that are under you?

Eckols: We have the Gonzales line department in charge of new construction, operation, and maintenance in our designated area. We have the ground department who’s in charge of hauling the poles, digging, setting and framing those poles in the Gonzales area, plus many of the larger jobs in the Seguin area. We do most all the pole hauling and framing on their larger jobs. We are in charge of right of way clearing, and that’s a big job in the Gonzales area and a considerable portion of the Seguin area. We also have the material department, which is in charge of purchasing all the line material required for the Co-op. Warehousing—a large warehouse in Gonzales, and then we have a warehouse in Seguin District office and some material in the area office in Schertz. The transportation department is in charge of the garage. We have had two full time mechanics, one service manager, and we handle all of the transportation problems in the Gonzales area; we handle all the major overhaul problems out of the Seguin District area.

Yancy: Okay. How has each department in your division grown since you became manager?

Eckols: Well, in 1969, when I was made electric system division manager, I was in charge of all outside operations for the entire Co-op, which involves some one hundred employees. That got to be such a job that we split off the engineering department several years ago [and] put that in charge of an engineering manager. Then, in 1985, we split off the Seguin District and put that under the Seguin District manager.

Yancy: Okay. Has the energy situation changed the services your division offers, and how so?

Eckols: Has the energy situation—

Yancy: The cost of energy—

Eckols: Well, I suppose, yes, it’s changed our division, particularly back when this thing first started turning around in 1973, ’74. It put a lot more pressure on our service people and our construction people because prices were going up; people were getting uneasy. As you know, GVEC is probably the foremost co-op in informing our membership through our newsletters, through our press releases, through our member information committee meetings. We have informed our people, and it is not really a problem today.

Yancy: Okay. What would you describe as your most important accomplishments? What changes have you implemented, and how successful were they?

Eckols: Well, as long as I’ve been here, through the years we’ve grown very fast. When I went to work, we had a list of member applications of about four thousand, just after World War II, and GVEC was just beginning to process those. Through the years, it has been a very enjoyable situation of growth with GVEC. We were very small at the time, and, of course, today we’ve a big co-op, but, of course, we’ve had to change through the years. As I was telling you a while ago, we reorganized in 1953, set up various departments. That worked real good until 1969, and we decided that we needed to reorganize again. Of course, there were a lot of changes made through those years, 1953 to ’69. In 1969, we went to divisions and got away from so many people having to report to the general manager. We had three divisions, and it worked very well until we got so large that we were having to cut that up into smaller sections. We broke away the engineering division and put it under an electrical engineer. Then we broke away from the Seguin District area and put it in under a district manager.

Yancy: Okay. In your opinion, what makes GVEC distinctive?

Eckols: First, GVEC is distinctive from the word go because it’s always been a progressive, hardworking, honest, open to its membership trying to inform them but very active in all the fields of construction and all electric programs. The employees themselves are all very dedicated people and don’t mind working hard and don’t mind associating with our membership and doing everything they can to give them the best possible service. I think one of the greatest things with my division is our record in membership outages. We have one of the lowest per member outage rates in the United States. In 1986, our average was 1.2 hours per member, where the national average is somewhere between three and four hours per member. So, we take great pride in that we’ve run a good solid organization.

Yancy: Have there been any innovations in your division while you have been manager? If so, what were they?

Eckols: Well, you say innovations, and I don’t particularly know what you are looking for, but at the same time we have started many, many programs, such as our right of way program. We probably have the most outstanding right of way program of any co-op in the nation because we attacked it from every direction. We not only have our manned crew with saws and axes, but we also have several crews with bucket trucks that trim the higher growing tress. We purchased five years ago a Kershaw Clearway, a large motorcycle, and we have pretty well covered our system with that particular machine. We also have a spray program where we go back in and treat the second growth from the mesquites that are cut down by these machines, and that’s going well. Back in engineering, we started our basic pole line, pole inspection program. That’s grown through the years. Numerous programs have been put in and implemented and have worked very successfully.

Yancy: What do you see as the future of your division and of GVEC?

Eckols: Well, being only three or four years away from retirement, of course, I can only speak for myself, it will continue to grow. The economy is very flat at the present time, and we have very few houses being built in our particular area, but I feel sure that this will level out in the next few years and we’ll see that continued growth that we’re looking at. I don’t think there are any limitations to GVEC. We’ve talked about getting into other areas, such as satellite programs, maybe butane business, maybe many other businesses that we’ve talked about. I think that the future of GVEC is just as bright as it was in 1947, when I started work here. It’s always been managed by very progressive people. It’s been backed by a very good board that makes those decisions that helps us have a good program.

End of interview