Blog

Superintendent Jim McCann is officially retired. O’Shea Team News sat down with Jim and Mike O’Shea to talk about a few career highlights.

This year is not the first time O’Sheas have dealt with a pandemic or epidemic. About one hundred years ago, O’Shea Builders’ founder -- Bud O’Shea’s grandfather John O’Shea -- dealt with an epidemic and pandemic within ten years.

On Mother’s Day 2020, John Kovalan saw his parents for the first time in three months. And to his dismay, he wasn’t even able to give them a hug.

The global health pandemic caused by the spread of coronavirus has certainly changed social behaviors, keeping family and friends apart (among many other practices). It’s also altered the construction industry, adding new layers to health and safety measures. 

During WWI, the federal government struggled to provide enough food for troops overseas. So, it encouraged citizens to grow their own food to help, and the so-called “Victory Garden” or “War Garden” was born. It was rekindled during WWII when the government went a step further and rationed food.

Life is like central Illinois weather – it changes in the blink of an eye. It did the night of March 12, 2006. 

O’Shea Team News interviewed Omar Sandoval, a senior at Centennial High School in Champaign, about job shadowing Superintendent Mike Thomas.

The O'Shea family's local roots go back to at least 1860, the year Abraham Lincoln was elected president and moved his office to what is now the Old State Capitol to accommodate the droves of people wanting to see him.

O’Shea recently participated in Sangamon-Menard Schools’ Multi-Craft Core Curriculum (MC3) program during fall 2019. The MC3 is a nationally recognized apprenticeship-readiness training curriculum that offers hands-on-learning and a pathway toward a construction career apprenticeship.

O’Shea’s “Iron Man,” a.k.a. Tim VanBrooker, is “officially” retired. O’Shea Team News sat down with Tim and Mike O’Shea to talk about a few career highlights.

The O’Shea family has been building churches longer than it’s had a construction business. According to family lore, Timothy O’Brien, the uncle of O’Shea Builders founder John O’Shea, built Springfield’s first St. Agnes Church and taught John carpentry.

In John Adams’ family, if you were old enough to carry a tool, you got to come along on the job.

John’s grandfather, Norbert, grew up on a farm and, by necessity, taught himself general construction. When he saw there was a need in the area, he began a residential construction company, which he operated for 40 years.

Bud O’Shea, CEO of O’Shea Builders, was drafted into the Army during the Cold War. After basic training in March 1957 in Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri and specialized training in August, Georgia, Bud was shipped out to Stuttgart, Germany.

In between, he got married to his sweetheart, Helene Eddington. “On my first leave, I proposed marriage to her and we were married at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Georgia at an Army chapel,” he says.

Matt Grider has known the O’Shea name for as long as he can remember. His grandfather, Darrell Grider, had a 41-year career with O’Shea Builders starting in 1965.

Randle earned his Bachelor’s degree in engineering - construction management from Southern Illinois University - Edwardsville.

Ellie Kasparie’s father was not the type to tell his kids to stay away from his tools.

He’d bring Ellie and her four siblings to his family-owned construction company on many Saturdays while they were growing up and let them explore.