Family Album

Granting the Wishes of the Wish Granters
By: Dan Cummings

As most of us already know, the Make-A-Wish Foundation is a favorite charity of Mike M. McCarthy and Midwest Division President Karl Kloster. Both will readily admit that nothing gives them greater joy than to bring a smile to a child's face, especially those that are faced with the challenges of life-threatening illnesses.

Through his work on the Board of Directors of Make-A-Wish, Karl recognized that the organization was not able to function at full capacity due to a serious lack of space. Karl's vision, coupled with the ever-present generosity of the McCarthy family (I'm talking Big Mike, Big Tim and Paddy), has now expanded this capacity by granting the foundation's wish of a newer and LARGER facility.

The old “Elam Masonry” building, on the McCarthy campus in St. Louis has been converted into their new headquarters. This structure had been sitting vacant for several years when Karl identified the potential that it had. The property is owned collectively by members of the McCarthy family. And once again, in traditional McCarthy giving style, they donated the use of the building.

With building in hand, Karl reached out to the St. Louis construction community for their help. ACI Boland took on the architectural responsibilities of converting the former offices and storage area of a masonry contractor into an office. Many of McCarthy's valued subcontractors and vendors donated goods and services.

As you might guess, coordination of this effort was necessary and who better to manage it than McCarthy's own. At a time when the company was as busy as it has even been, it was not easy to find someone with enough time.

The first enlisted was Jerry Bane who was helping to establish Compass Services. Jerry got things “jump started” but was replaced by Steve Black when he was called to Priory Abbey. Steve was involved long enough to get the trenches cut in the floors and get the walls framed. Enter Rod Gremaud.

Rod ran back and forth between his project at Bridge Information Systems and the Make A Wish project on a daily basis. He's the guy that had the task of bringing it all together for finishes. Although the building is relatively small, the fact that most of the goods and services were “donated” made it a lot more difficult. As things were nearing completion, Rod got the call to go to the St. Louis City Justice Center project. Since Rod had things well under control, I stepped in, swept the floors, shined the knobs, and took all the credit. Do I have great timing or what?

A great deal of help was also realized from Fred Kern, Rodney Hulse, Kenny Shoults, and several of the drivers and yard workers under their charge. Several McCarthy tradesman also lent their expertise to the endeavor. Harvey Nolting was in charge of the installation of the exterior concrete walls and some of the interior rough work. Paul Hanlon patched roofing, hung doors, installed hardware, etc. Jerry Stackle patched floors and kept the areas clean for the work crews. Boyce Hilt installed the architectural wall rails.

As we strive to achieve our goal of “Best Builder in America,” we must keep in mind that we can't possibly get there without giving back to the communities that provide our business opportunities. At McCarthy, “giving” is a part of the company culture.