Carroll County Chronicles Fall 2020

As far as is known, Grover completed one year of high school. However, all of the Skaggs children did well in life.

In 1909, William married Callie Bruce and was living in Rocky Station in Lee County with her parents in 1910, working as a public school teacher. He volunteered for the army when WWI broke out and spent a year in France.

Also, in 1909, Grover had married Carrie Kirk and was also living in Rocky Station with her parents in 1910, working at “odd jobs.“

By 1920, Grover and his wife were in living in Ansted, in Fayette County, WV where he was working as a coal miner. William and his new wife, Annie Reeves were living in Burnsville in Yancey County, NC where he was working as a Civil Engineer on an electric line. It isn’t known what happened to his first wife… or how he was able to sell himself as a Civil Engineer since that was not in the curriculum of the academy he attended. Perhaps this bit of work experience made William feel confident enough to go out on his own. He convinced his brother that their futures were in becoming entrepreneurs in the electrical power generation field. In the summer of 1921, the brothers came to Hillsville with the idea of building a hydro-electric dam and providing electricity to the town. They scouted several creeks for a potential dam site and eventually settled upon Little Reed Island Creek just past where it crosses Water Plant Road. Although the newspaper of the day purported them to be “experienced hydro - electric engineers,” in actuality neither was. William, possibly had some rudimentary knowledge of electricity, having worked on an electric line, but there is no indication that Grover had any knowledge or experience at all in that area although years later he would work as an electrician. However, an electrician is a far cry from an engineer.

We don’t know exactly how they settled on Hillsville as a prime location for their endeavor, but they met with town leaders and sold their idea to the town and a

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