June 2013
| Business World Magazine | 173
The author and historian William Gilmore Simms once described genius as the
eye of intellect and the wing of thought. “Genius,” he said, “is always in ad-
vance of its time, and is the pioneer for the generation which it precedes.” In
Oklahoma, such ingenuity enabled a team in the telecom industry to eye the
future and form a cooperative which has not only given wing to thought, but
a lot of pictures and text messages too. By taking advantage of opportunities
well in advance of their time, this enterprise has not only become a pioneer
to the generation it preceded, but a pioneer for generations to come.
More than sixty years ago, forged with a vi-
sion and an initiative to effectively deliver
telephone and eventually wireless telecom-
munication services to the residents of west-
ern Oklahoma, Pioneer Telephone Coop-
erative was established and has since earned
distinction as one of the largest coopera-
tively owned telecommunications compa-
nies in the United States. Headquartered in
Kingfisher, Oklahoma, the Board of Trust-
ees, Management and employees at Pioneer
are driven to fulfill the expectations of their
shareholders, which in this case, is not some
share of movers and shakers engaged in the
machination of stock trading. As a coopera-
tive, its shareholders are the very customers
who require, and rely, on the landline and
other broadband telecommunication ser-
