Copy shortlink: Just off the main drag in Avon, a sleepy town in the middle of Stearns County, is a fourth-generation company steeped in experience building the infrastructure that powers America. The company helped build the Great Northern Railroad a century ago, the state and interstate highway systems post-World War II, and now some of the largest and most complex energy projects on the continent. David Henry Blattner formed the firm as a railway contractor company in 1907. Now, great-grandson Scott Blattner, the company's president, has shepherded it through the most recent transition — shifting focus from D.H. Blattner & Sons to a new sister company, Blattner Energy, which has become a national leader as a renewable-energy contractor specializing in building wind farms, solar farms and energy storage infrastructure.