Charles Strait collection of electrical power company records and photographs

Charles Strait is a Muncie native who joined Indiana & Michigan Electric Company as a lineman in the late 1940s, working for the company until his retirement in the 1980s. While employed by I&M, Mr. Strait rescued a large group of photographs documenting the company's history from a trash container and returned them to the I&M administration. When the company moved out of its old building in the early 1980s, Strait again rescued the same photographs from the trash and this time he donated them to Archives & Special Collections.

Wiley W. (Bill) Spurgeon, in his book Muncie & Delaware County: An Illustrated Retrospective writes that Muncie's first electric light plant was built at the instigation of James Boyce, early Muncie businessman, and others in the 1880s. The first plant, called Muncie Electric Light Company, was located at Howard and Elm Street. In 1901 the plant was moved to Walnut and Gilbert Street, and in 1904, was sold to the Electric Company of America. Activity increased at the local plant in the years 1905 and 1906 as the natural gas deposits in the county failed rapidly and businesses found it necessary to look for some other type of fuel for industrial use. In January, 1907, the company again reorganized under the name of the American Gas and Electric Company. By 1908, demand for electric current grew so fast that larger generators and larger 2300-volt feeders had to be installed and two sub-stations were created, one located at Ball Brothers Glass Mfg. Company on Macedonia Avenue and the other at Muncie Products, on Sampson Avenue. American Gas and Electric Company also owned plants in Marion, Hartford City and Elwood, Indiana. In 1918, the various plants were combined under the name of Indiana General Service Company. In the early 1950s, the company changed names again, becoming Indiana & Michigan Electric Co. It carried that name until Mr. Strait's retirement. The North Walnut Street plant was razed in the 1960s.