text: **Note 1. Summary of Significant Accounting Policies**
  
  ***Description of business:***Shenandoah Telecommunications Company and subsidiaries (the Company) provides 
  telephone service, wireless personal communications service (PCS) under the Sprint brand name, cable television, 
  unregulated communications equipment sales and services, Internet access, and paging services. In addition, the 
  Company leases towers and operates and maintains an interstate fiber optic network. The Company's operations are 
  located in the four state region surrounding the Northern Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. Pursuant to a management 
  agreement with Sprint Communications Company and its related parties (collectively, “Sprint”), the Company is the 
  exclusive PCS Affiliate of Sprint providing wireless mobility communications network products and services in the 
  geographic area extending from Altoona, Harrisburg and York, Pennsylvania, south through Western Maryland, and 
  the panhandle of West Virginia, to Harrisonburg, Virginia. The Company is licensed to use the Sprint brand name in 
  this territory, and operates its network under the Sprint radio spectrum license (Note 7). A summary of the Company's 
  significant accounting policies follows: 
  
  ***Stock split:***All share and per share information reflect the two for one stock split announced in October 2003, to 
  shareholders of record as of the close of business on January 30, 2004. The additional shares were distributed on 
  February 20, 2004. The effective date of the split is February 23, 2004. All previously reported share and per share 
  data included herein are retroactively adjusted to reflect the split. 