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the dam commissioned 26 February 1900 · first power 16 December 1903
A founding without founders' names: The Twin Branch works — the dam, the steam station, and the neighborhood that took their name — were built by Sanderson & Porter of New York for the St. Joseph and Elkhart Power Company, which commissioned the dam on 26 February 1900 in the dam's reference profile; power was first produced on 16 December 1903, and the works made Mishawaka, in its own historian's phrase, the Power City. The men who organized the power company are not named in the record reached for this build — the profile names the engineering firm and the company, not its incorporators — and the gap is printed rather than filled: the settling sources are the company's incorporation record and the South Bend Tribune's 1900–03 business pages.
The documented principal: The power house's one documented chief actor is a buyer. In 1904 Charles A. Chapin purchased, for over $1,000,000, the interest the South Bend Electric Company held in the dam — a seven-figure transaction by a named man in the record's second year of the works. In 1907 the St. Joseph and Elkhart Power Company merged with the Indiana & Michigan company, and the dam has been owned and operated by American Electric Power / Indiana Michigan Power since 1922, at the profile's strength; the hydro plant still generates in 2026, the oldest hydro facility in the AEP fleet. The power company's officers between Chapin's purchase and the merger stand with its founders in the named gaps.
Sources:
- Businesses & Banks — "Twin Branch — the dam, the Power City, and the neighborhood" (Sanderson & Porter's construction for the St. Joseph and Elkhart Power Company, commissioned 26 February 1900; first power 16 December 1903; Chapin's 1904 purchase at over $1,000,000; the 1907 merger; AEP/I&M ownership from 1922; the plant generating in 2026 as the AEP fleet's oldest hydro facility).