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About Us
The Benton Ridge Farmer's Mutual Telephone Company was founded in 1902 by Peter A. Kemerer and George W. Brown. In the first years of the company, G.W. Brown served as president, P.A. Kemerer served as secretary, Pete Baldwin as lineman, and Carrie and Molly Hughes as operators. Until about 1910, the central office for the Telephone Company was in the William Huffman building. From about 1911 until 1922, the central office was located at the SW corner of Main and East Streets. In 1922, the central office was moved to the NW corner of Main and Elm Streets and remained there until 1959.

In 1957, the company was changed from a Mutual "non-profit" organization to the Benton Ridge Telephone Company, a "profit corporation." In 1959, the conversion was made to dial phones and in 1960, direct long-distant dialing was installed. In 1967, the Telephone Company was awarded the AUTOVON contract and this division began serving the Department of Defense in 1970. In 1971, the Telephone Company obtained extended area service to Findlay. Through the years, the Benton Ridge Telephone Company has remained an independent organization.

The Company has expanded its operations through the years and purchased the North Creek exchange in 1978 and the New Bavaria exchange in 1981. Also, on October 26, 1981, the Company updated the AUTOVON equipment with a 2,000 line digital switch. The Benton Ridge exchange was converted to digital on January 8, 1988.

Aside from the telephone operations, the Company also formed the B.R. Cablevision Company on March 14, 1983 and began to provide cable television service to the village of Benton Ridge and the surrounding area on December 1, 1983. In 1989, B.R. Security was formed to provide a Central Station monitoring service for alarm companies.

In the 90’s, the Benton Ridge Telephone Company has expanded by first creating WATCH TV in 1991 and bright.net-BRT in 1995. WATCH TV provides wireless cable television to over 15,000 customers in northwest and west central Ohio. bright.net-BRT provides access to the Internet in Hancock and parts of surrounding counties. And in 2004, we acquired seven towers previously owned by ComWavz, to further expand our internet offerings. All of these divisions are in accordance with the company’s theme of "Total Communication."