It was many years after the completion of gas and water service in Beloit that electricity was generally used. Several industries lighted their buildings with electricity, and it was used by the city to illuminate streets and intersections before electric lamps replaced the familiar gas jet and elaborate gas fixtures in homes.

William A. Knapp, who came to Beloit late in the 1870s, was the first man to envision wide use of electrical energy, and it was his proposal that ultimately developed into facilities that served the community.

He attended Beloit College when he first came to this community. The Beloit Electric Light & Power Company was organized and it began to sell electricity in 1887. Accounts of the early founding of utilities reveal that the original franchise was granted to William A. Knapp, January 6, 1887.

He built the first electric plant on the race about where Charles H. Besly & Company is located now. On June 4, 1891, a franchise was granted to Wiley, Warner & Company, and William A. Knapp was associated with that organization.

In the meantime, the plant had been moved to another location not far away from the original site and a steam engine had been added to supplement generators driven by water.

He left Beloit about 1900. He died September 12, 1930, at the age of 71 at Menominee, Wisconsin.