First incorporated in 1913, Public Service Company of Oklahoma (PSO) commemorated 100 years of providing service to Oklahomans earlier this year
However, PSO’s origins date back even farther. In 1889, 18 years before statehood, the Vinita Electric Light, Ice, and Power Company was chartered to provide electric service in Indian Territory. In 1913 PSO was organized by combining the original Vinita company with other small electric companies from Tulsa, Atoka, Coalgate, Lehigh, and Guthrie.
In its early years, PSO’s People’s Ice Company subsidiary was larger than the electric business, producing and delivering ice before home electric refrigerators became available. As PSO purchased additional small electric systems, it also acquired other side businesses, such as municipal water systems, a meat packing plant, an interurban passenger railway, and even a soda pop bottling plant.
PSO has grown into an electric utility serving more than 540,000 customers in 232 communities across 30,000 square miles of eastern and southwestern Oklahoma. The company employs nearly 1,500 employees and has a generating capacity of 4,269 megawatts.
In May, as part of its centennial celebrations, PSO donated about 300 digital images to the Tulsa Historical Society & Museum. These photographs contain a variety of historical images of Tulsa and Tulsans throughout the last 100 years.