Public utilities provide electric, gas, water or telephone service to customers in a specified area. Utilities have a duty to provide safe and adequate service on reasonable terms to anyone who lives within the service area on without discriminating between customers. Because most utilities operate in near monopolistic conditions, they can be heavily regulated by local, state, and federal authorities. Generally, the local and state agencies are called Public Service Commissions (PSC) or Public Utility Commissions (PUC). Municipal Utilities and Rural Electric Cooperatives may be unregulated though.
Sprankle Mills is a small unincorporated rural community in Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located between the boroughs of Punxsutawney and Brookville. Sprankle Mills was founded in 1833 by Frederick Sprankle who owned a mill in the middle of town. Primarily a farming community this town, in the mid to late 1800s, had two general stores, a post office and a one room school house. The post office, which was located in one of the general stores, was a working post office until the late 1980s. While the one-room school house is still standing it is primarily used as a gathering place for residents during occasions such as the first day of fishing season and on voting days. The last class of students to use the building as a school was in 1962. This small farming community consisted of German settlers. Some of the original residents have ancestors occupying the original homesteads. Some of these names include: Raybuck, Mottern, and Mauk.