You don't know anything about Peachtree City until you've eaten peas and cornbread at Floy Farr's table.

Even if you don't get to share an old-fashioned noon meal with this wise man and civic leader, just a conversation with him can teach you a lot about life, not to mention the Fayette city he helped to start and build.

Farr also was there when "the lights came on" in rural Fayette County, when Peachtree City was just acre after acre of cotton and corn. Coweta-Fayette Electric Membership Corporation set up shop in Newnan in 1945, bringing electric power to rural areas of the two counties, plus small parts of nearby counties. Farr became an almost legendary figure in rural electrification, serving as the local EMC president 1976-95. He still serves on the board of Oglethorpe Power Company, the consortium of EMCs that now rivals Georgia Power in size.

For these 50-plus years, Floy Farr has been associated not just with business and progress in Peachtree City, but with personal leadership and service to a populace that gave him the status of "friend and neighbor." Because they knew he cared, and because the EMC's offices in Newnan could be reached only by paying long-distance charges, almost everybody with a power problem called Farr at his home or office.

"Most of us know the well-publicized development highlights of the EMC," says Joel Cowan, whose dedication and expertise also helped shape the city, "but few realize the individual efforts Mr. Farr made during ice storms and the other crises of an electric utility. I've seen him put in 24-hour days, responding to customers and making sure they received the proper attention. As far as western Fayette County was concerned, he was it."

Farr confirmed that his telephone rang at all hours. One woman, he said, called at 2 a.m. just to let him know how thrilled she would be to get the well-water pump back, once the power was restored. The hands-on team that brought modern conveniences to Fayette homes and businesses would be hard-pressed to handle the EMC's 56,502 customers today, Farr said.

He added that the utility would really suffer from ice storms because of the "tremendous amount of lines we had," to fulfill President Franklin Roosevelt's mandate to bring power to everybody who wanted it. Today, the EMC has 2,638 miles of overhead lines and 1,822 miles buried underground.

Farr says the company is adding about 2,000 meters every year and is forecasting a 6.4 percent growth rate for the next 10 years. Farr's figures show that the company pays more than $10,000,000 in ad valorem taxes annually. He adds that the majority of users are residential, nearly 75 percent, with another 15 percent comprised of small commercial and industrial users. Some of the larger power users are Photocircuits, Fayette Community Hospital, and the school systems in the two counties. Retirement from the board doesn't mean he's cut ties, Farr says, just that "it's somebody else's time."

The 86-year-old describes himself as "real active, I do a lot of walking and I like to play golf, but I'm not a good golfer." He has an escape place at Sky Valley and has traveled all over the world, "but I don't forget that I plowed a mule. During the Depression, I learned two things that I have not forgotten: I learned how to work hard, and I learned the value of a dollar." He's been a banker, cotton gin manager and fertilizer seller, but admits that one of his more profitable ventures was always "buying and selling land."

Farr's sense of civic responsibility has been passed on to his sons, Walter and Tom. Dr. Walter Farr has a successful practice in El Paso, Tex., but is now serving a two-year stint at an Indian public health hospital north of Phoenix, Ariz. Tom is a Peachtree City banker who is presently chairman of the Peachtree City Development Authority.

"The roughest thing" that Farr has had to face in his life, he says, is his beloved wife's battle with Alzheimer's disease. Bruce Loyd Farr is "getting excellent care at Ashley Glenn, I go see her every day and sometimes take her for outings, but it has been really rough."