This program presents three documentaries produced in the early 1940s by the USDA’s Rural Electrification Administration (REA). An ambitious collaboration between a government agency and a host of acclaimed entertainment professionals, the films feature the real-life Parkinson family and were made to encourage farmers to take out government loans to modernize their farms.. POWER AND THE LAND shows the Parkinsons laboring to run a dairy without benefit of electricity before obtaining an REA loan and then gladly giving up their manual water pump, kerosene lanterns, and horse-drawn plow. Along with BIP GOES TO TOWN and WORST OF FARM DISASTERS, the film now offers a close look at the domestic routines of a bygone era while capturing a time when many Americans, for a variety of reasons, were compelled to trade tradition for efficiency.