Ex-county leader Ken Krueger dies at 72

Ken Krueger was a big man — big in humor, big on work ethic, big on community, big in size.

And the former Flathead County commissioner and West Valley farmer left a big mark on the state he called home for the past six decades.

Krueger, 72, died Saturday.

“He was terrific,” Jay Downen said. Downen, a Flathead Electric Cooperative board member and former chief executive officer and general manager for Montana Electrical Cooperatives’ Association in Great Falls for 15 years, witnessed Krueger’s ability to find a common link where others saw none.

Krueger’s father, Fred, was one of the founders of Flathead Electric Cooperative and served on its board of directors. In 1972 Krueger took over for his dad, served as board president from 1977 to 1984 and rode herd as population rose and the cooperative grew.

But it was when the North Dakota native took a board position with Montana Electric Cooperatives’ Association that Krueger’s influence spread. Krueger, a common man who knew how to build a co-op from the ground up as well as put up and take down a power line, helped bridge a cultural and economic gap between Eastern and Western Montana.

“He was state president” who understood human dynamics and politics, Downen said. “He came in at a time of turmoil and was just a rock.”

Krueger worked to pass several key pieces of legislation — among them, providing territory protection for investor-owned utilities and cooperatives alike, retaining undistributed patronage credits for local schools instead of reverting to the state, and protecting a cooperative’s solvency against incompetent board management.

Krueger soon found himself representing a half-dozen Pacific Northwest states on the board of directors for the Cooperative Finance Corporation, the primary source of private-market financing for electric cooperatives nationwide.

In 1982, he was elected a Flathead County commissioner. He served until Mary Adkins defeated him in the 1988 Democratic primary. In 1992 he was appointed as interim county commissioner.

Although elected as a Democrat, Downen said, Krueger didn’t fit the mold.

“He was a populist,” he said, “but he was pretty conservative.”

Krueger was a lifelong farmer who raised wheat, barley, peppermint and alfalfa in the Stillwater River area along Church Drive.

“He was seen as the guy in the Flathead that agriculture could look to,” Downen said. When farming profits sagged several years ago and showed no signs of rebounding, Krueger led the fundraising effort to build a community still for peppermint crops that farmers turned to for new hope.

He was a practical joker, Downen remembered, a part of the Sykes’ Restaurant crew. But when he built his own barn at his farm, Krueger included a coffee room that became a gathering place for the neighborhood and anybody else passing by.

Krueger also served on the West Valley school board, Montana Wheat and Barley Board, National Barley Board, Stillwater Grange and 25-plus years as board chairman of the Montana Electrical Cooperatives’ Association.