Star-Journbal Editor
The Energizer Bunny could sure learn a thing or two from Fredrick David, the electrical contractor who kept his business going and going and going by transforming positively-charged service into a steady current of customers for the past 44 years.
But after putting out about a gazillion kilowatt hours of his own energy wiring scores of area homes, businesses, churches, car lots, grain elevators, and football stadiums, David, the owner of Elcon Services, Inc., says it's time to recharge his batteries.
In other words, he's retiring.
"I was getting tired of it, and don't have the endurance I had at one time," David said. "I'll probably still do some electrical work for a time. I have a lot of jobs that I've started that I'll probably complete. But I do plan to slow down a little bit."
The business has been sold to David's longtime partner, Gilbert Suderman of Hillsboro, who plans to retain the Elcon name, and the well-grounded practices that helped the company grow.
"I would like to thank the many customers for their business the past 44 years," David said. "People in this area have been great to me. I guess they were satisfied with the service I gave them because I never lacked for work."
A 1954 graduate of Tampa High School, David worked as an apprentice in McPherson before wiring up his own business in Hillsboro in 1963. His first job created a buzz all over town.
"Irv Schroeder put up a used car lot and I was putting the lights up on the lot," David said.
"The lot was across the street from the old post office, and people saw me when they came in and out. I worked there two or three days, and then had so much work, I didn't know how I was going to do it all. I never really lacked for work all those years."
David and his "steady, reliable employees" wired grocery stores, oil field rigs, grain elevators, even the towering lights at the Tabor College football stadium.
Except for the Holy Spirit himself, no one provided more power to local churches over the past four decades than Elcon, Inc. Projects included Hillsboro United Methodist Church and the new Hillsboro Mennonite Brethren Church.
Even after so much success in the electrical business, David still gets his biggest charge from the connection he made at the altar with his wife, Doris, 41 years ago. She was a widow with five children, and they added a sixth child.
Today the David family grid keeps going and growing, and includes 13 great-grandchildren.
"We have a wonderful family," David said.
