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On the prairies of southwest Minnesota, hundreds of wind turbines generate so much electricity that the state's largest utility, Xcel Energy, plans to build over a hundred miles of new transmission lines to bring power east to the Twin Cities. If the project is approved, it will be the biggest one built in Minnesota since a nationwide boom in transmission line construction ended twenty years ago. Some in the industry say now we need to build the next wave of transmission lines. But in Minnesota, many people remember a time when a powerline project went wrong. In the late 1970's, a mass protest swept through the normally conservative farm country of west central Minnesota. Farmers tried to stop construction of a 400 mile long transmission line that would cross their land on the way from North Dakota to the Twin Cities. In this special report, "Powerline Blues," MPR reporter Mary Losure looks back the conflict through the eyes of people who lived it. It's a story of how a system they didn't think was fair turned ordinary people into radicals.

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Digitization made possible by the State of Minnesota Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, approved by voters in 2008.

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