Portland General Electric history

On June 3, 1889, the company lit its first small circuit of Portland street lights.

So in 1890 the company bought two 4,000-volt alternators from Westinghouse.

To meet increasing demand, Eastham and Morey took on new investors and reincorporated as Portland General Electric (PGE) on August 5, 1892.

1894 Nation's first public showing of motion pictures; swollen Willamette River causes Portland's worst flood in history, putting 250 city blocks underwater.

1895 PGE's Station B, now the T.W. Sullivan Plant, is completed on the west side of Willamette Falls, to meet growing load in Portland, including electric railways.

1900 The nation's first escalator is displayed.

1902 Henry Goode becomes PGE President.

Realizing what positive advertising could do for the city and for PGE, Goode convinced the company's backers to invest $300,000 in a new steam generator to light the 1905 Lewis & Clark Centennial and American Exposition Oriental Fair.

1906 Portland got it's first movie theater.

In 1907 PREL&P completed the Cazadero Plant, a Clackamas River hydroelectric facility that increased available power by one-third.

By 1908 gross revenue from railway operations was nearly three times that from light and power operations.

1909 PGE's Electric Building opens on Sixth Avenue and Alder Street in Portland.

1910 The Company's Station L steam plant in Portland is completed; Pacific Power & Light, serving 17 communities scattered throughout Oregon and Washington, is incorporated.

1911 PGE signs a 15 year contract with North Coast Power Co. to provide electricity to customers in Beaverton and surrounding Washington County; the Company's River Mill Plant is completed on the Clackamas River; Oregon begins regulating electric utilities; air conditioner introduced by Carrier.

1912 PRL&P purchases assets of Mt.

Railway operations continued to grow until they peaked in 1913 with revenues at just under $4 million a year.

1914-18 World War I; first fully automatic electric ranges and electric toasters are produced.

1920 Women win the right to vote (19th Constitutional Amendment); nation's first licensed radio broadcasting station begins operating; Federal Power Act gives federal government purview over navigable streams (and their potential power generation).

1922 KGW Radio was the first commercial radio station.

1925-26 PEPCO takes over service to Lake Oswego and St Helens areas, as well as Beaverton and surrounding east Washington County from Banks in the north to Sherwood in the south.

1927 First solo flight from New York to Paris by Charles Lindbergh, who dedicates Portland's first airport the same year; talking pictures are demonstrated.

1928 Oregon voters defeat a proposal for PEPCO to buy out Northwester, our Portland competitor; electric razor invented by Schick.

After the stock market crash of 1929, PUH turned over its PEPCO stock to another utility holding company, Central Public Service Corporation (CPS) of Chicago.

Pacific Northwest Public Service Co. (with PGE resurrected as the name of its electric subsidiary)-1930-32

1931 Oregon Legislature passes a law allowing voters to create people's utility districts (PUDs); office of Oregon Public Utility Commissioner created; Oregon Public Utility Commissioner succeeds the Public Service Commission to regulate utilities.

The company name became Portland Electric Power Company (PEPCO) in 1932.

1935 United States District Court in Portland approves reorganization plan after PEPCO is forced into receivership for defaulting on debenture coupons; IBM introduces the first successful electric typewriter; Congress passes the Rural Electrification Act (REA).

1936 Oregon voters defeat a proposal to create a PUD spanning seven counties - including five in the Company's service area.

1937 Bonneville Dam - the Northwest's first federal hydroelectric project - is completed on the Columbia River; Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) formed.

1938 Molalla Electric Co. and Yamhill Electric Co. merge with PGE; first traffic lights in Portland (Southwest 10th and 11th at Burnside) and in Salem; fluorescent lighting introduced.

By 1940 the company had again become profitable.

1941 The nation enters World War II; another federal hydroelectric project on the Columbia River, Grand Coulee Dam, is completed.

Power plants ran at full steam, and in 1942 the company joined the Northwest Power Pool as part of a general effort to better coordinate the use of the region's power resources.

By 1945, PGE derived nearly $400,000 in revenue from the two Kaiser shipyards in Oregon.

Judge Fee ruled the bankruptcy reorganization complete on June 29, 1946.

1947 Power shortage threatens Northwest, with brownouts occurring in Central Oregon in the winter; transistor invented.

1948 PGE begins operating as an independent corporation involved in light and power services only; Thomas Delzell is Chairman; Columbia River floods, affecting Portland and Vancouver.

1950 Congress passes the River and Harbor and Flood Control Act, empowering Corps of Engineers to proceed with Columbia Basin hydro projects, including Priest Rapids, John Day, and The Dalles dams.

1952 Portland's first television broadcast.

1953 PGE signs a 20 year contract to receive power from BPA.

1955 Frank Warren becomes PGE President.

1956 PGE acquires Sandy Electric Co-op, extending its service territory to Government Camp on Mount Hood; natural gas introduced in PGE's service area; PGE's Portland Service Center is built; all-electric homes marketed nationwide (later called Bronze or Gold Medallion homes).

1957 PGE representatives observe as the commercial nuclear industry is born in Shippingport, PA., when Duquesne Light Co.'s nuclear plant begins operation; the Soviet Union sends Sputnik into space.

1958 PGE's Pelton Plant is completed on the Deschutes River, after a decade-long political struggle that goes to the United States Supreme Court; the Company's North Fork Plant is completed on the Clackamas River.

1959 Oregon's centennial; PGE builds a display entitled "Electri-city" for the 100-day Oregon Centennial Exposition; first photocopier introduced by Xerox.

1961 The nation's first manned space flight made by Alan Shepard.

1964 PGE's Round Butte Plant is completed on the Deschutes River; Frank Warren assumes PGE Chairman responsibilities; Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution; the nation enters the Vietnam War; Christmas Flood of 1964 affects Oregon rivers and wreaks havoc with PGE's system.

1965 Peach Bottom nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania-funded by PGE and 51 other utilities goes on-line; power blackouts experienced on the East Coast.

On February 14, 1967, PGE President Frank Warren announced plans for a 1.1 million-kilowatt nuclear plant along the Columbia River.

PGE began the mammoth undertaking of constructing the Trojan Nuclear Plant in 1968.

1969 Neil Armstrong is the first man on the moon, courtesy of United StatesApollo II.

In 1970 the company asked for and was granted permission to make the first of ten rate increases it would need over the decade.

1972 PGE and PP&L sign a service exchange agreement, ending duplication of services throughout Portland.

Fortunately for PGE, these plants came on line just before a 1973 drought threatened to create a hydropower shortage in the area.

1974 PGE's Beaver Combustion Plant begins operation near Clatskanie.

Construction dragged on, and it was not until December of 1975 that what was then the largest nuclear facility in the nation was finally completed at a cost of $420 per kilowatt of capacity.

1977 Frank Warren officially takes title of PGE Chairman and CEO; Robert Short becomes PGE President; Three Mile Island (TMI) accident on March 28, near Harrisburg, PA, heightens public scrutiny of nuclear power.

When Bob Short, a former journalist and PGE lobbyist, became PGE chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) in 1980, he faced a recessionary Oregon with a reduced demand for electricity and a population with little patience for rising rates and expensive nuclear power plants.

1982 PGE cancels plans for its Pebble Springs nuclear project; AT&T is forced to split up.

In 1983 the company wrote off its $250 million investment in the Pebble Springs and Skagit Plants and three years later wrote off its share of the Washington Public Power Supply System.

1985 A new PGE subsidiary, Columbia Willamette Development Co., is created to pursue real estate projects.

Because PGE's corporate structure made these non-utility subsidiaries subject to regulation by the Public Utility Commission and put them at a disadvantage in the marketplace, the company reorganized in 1986 as the Portland General Corporation.

1989 Richard Reiten becomes PGC President; PGE starts the year serving more than 550,000 customers; the Company relights the Hawthorne Bridge as part of its centennial celebration.

The Trojan nuclear plant had to be closed for lengthy repairs, and on November 13, 1991, the company announced it would write off its entire $45 million investment in the financially troubled power producer Bonneville Pacific Corporation.

1993 PGE closes Trojan for economic reasons.

1996 Enron announces plan to purchase PGE. Work begins on an update at the Faraday Plant.

Most were unsuccessful, but an exception was in 1999, when PGE announced it was selling its customer base in St Helens, Scappoose, and Columbia City to West Oregon Electric PUD for $7.9 million.

She became CEO in 2000, and led PGE as it severed its ties to Enron Corp. and emerged as an independent, public company.

2001 PGE and the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs sign an official agreement giving the tribes one-third ownership of the Pelton Round Butte hydro project.

2003 First container of spent nuclear rods at Trojan is moved into dry storage.

The TPG purchase offer was denied by the Oregon Public Utility Commission, a three-member regulatory board, on March 10, 2005.

2007 Port Westward Plant becomes PGE’s first new generating plant in more than a decade to go online.

2008 Construction on Phase 1 of Biglow Canyon Wind Farm is completed, and construction begins on Biglow Canyon Phase 2.

2009 February Peggy announces her retirement.

2010 PGE’s 10-year naming contract ends with PGE Park.

PGE's Hawthorne Building turn 100 in 2011; PGE was called Portland Railway Light & Power.

2013 PGE is ranked highest in the Western United States in overall business customer satisfaction, according to results from the J.D. Power and Associates 2013 Electric Utility Business Customer Satisfaction Study.