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| One of many MoDOT projects for Fred Weber, Highway 21 at Butler Lake. (Pictured above): Three images from the early days of Fred Weber Inc. |
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By Glen Sparks
The best place for the story to start is probably 1928, the year Mickey Mouse made his debut in “Plane Crazy,” Babe Ruth hit 54 home runs and Alexander Fleming discovered the wonder drug, penicillin.
Fred Weber Sr. was already in business for himself by then, delivering ice and coal to St. Louis homes. He had bought his first truck in 1920 from Oliver “Captain” Watkins at Seventh Street and Broadway, and started hauling rocks from local quarries to construction sites. He hired his first employees in 1926, and his motto was, “Kill time by working it to death.”
In 1928, on Fox Creek Road between Highway 66 and Route 100 in St. Louis County, Weber landed a contract for excavation and pipe work. When he signed on the dotted line, that was the formal start of Fred Weber Inc.
Today, Fred Weber is a company of more than 600 employees, with annual revenues exceeding $200 million. Headquartered in Maryland Heights, it has completed some of the biggest construction projects in the metropolitan area, and operates more than 400 pieces of mobile equipment.
 Fred Weber’s crew paving at I-270 and Page Avenue. |
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Recent Fred Weber projects include the single-point interchange at Route 141 and Big Bend Boulevard; the Chesterfield Commons Bridge; the Highway 141 Overpass at Manchester Road; and the Route 364 bridges over Creve Coeur Lake. On any given day, Fred Weber has a hand in 20 projects.
“We’re probably the largest contractor for MoDOT (the Missouri Department of Transportation) in eastern Missouri,” says Thomas E. Barta, executive vice president. “We make a tremendous contribution in maintaining a strong infrastructure for
this area.”
Because Fred Weber operates its own quarries, asphalt plants and concrete plants, the company can save customers both time and money. And because it functions as the general contractor, it usually controls most of its projects. MoDOT and Fred Weber officers and engineers meet before the start of each project to discuss goals and to write a mission statement.
THOMAS P. DUNNE
chairman and CEO,
Fred Weber Inc. |
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“We feel fortunate when Fred Weber gets the contract to do work for MoDOT,” says state engineer John Lewis. “We have the confidence that Fred Weber will do the job right and do it on budget.”
The state of Missouri rates contractors on a point system and consistently has rated Fred Weber as Best in Business and Best of the Biggest.
Fred Weber Sr. died in 1963, but Barta says his spirit and philosophy remain strong. “I hesitate to use the term visionary, but that’s really what he was,” Barta says. “He knew what was needed as far as infrastructure improvement in St. Louis. He knew what was going to happen in the metropolitan area and kept in the forefront of the improvements. This is a man who started out with one truck, and look at what he did.”
Today, Thomas P. Dunne serves as chairman and CEO of Fred Weber Inc. Since assuming his role in 1986, he has directed the creation of new divisions at the company, the merging of others and a recent expansion of services to Illinois. He likes to emphasize the “we” in Weber.
“We encourage innovation and good ideas,” Dunne says. “Our people are some of the best in the business. I always say that you can be very successful as long as you don’t worry about who gets the credit.”
Dunne stresses that transportation is one of the key elements to a successful region. “So many cities across this country are competing for business,” he says. “One thing that they are looking at as they make a decision to develop is a strong infrastructure. You want those smooth, good roads.”
To accomplish that, Dunne believes there needs to be a fundamental shift in the way Missouri government approaches transportation. “It doesn’t matter if you are talking about Republicans or Democrats,” he says. “You need to have people who are going to be progressive. They need to understand the importance of a good road system. There needs to be a different mindset.”
THOMAS E. BARTA
executive vice president,
Fred Weber Inc. |
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One of the reasons Dunne expanded the company into Illinois, is what he describes as the Lincoln state’s outlook toward infrastructure. “I love St. Louis, but Illinois is more forward-thinking about building good roads,” he says. “That’s one reason we are doing more work there. Remember, too, that it is our neighbor.”
Looking forward, Dunne believes the future for the St. Louis region is bright. “Missouri has every means of transportation that you can think of—barges, air, rail, cars, trucks, everything,” he says. “We should be the transportation hub of, not just the Midwest, but of the country.
“We’ll be there to build the roads.”
Weber “hooks up” Pattonville High
The 117 rooms and two gymnasiums at Pattonville High School stay a comfortable 68 to 70 degrees thanks to a unique partnership with Fred Weber Inc. Pattonville may be the only high school in the United States that is heated by methane gas. A 3,600-foot pipeline carries the gas from an 85-acre landfill at Fred Weber to Pattonville High.
| Pattonville High School. |
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Members of the Pattonville environmental club first thought of using methane gas to heat the school. As material at the landfill decomposes, it produces gas, about 50 percent of which is methane. Club members brought their idea to the Pattonville School Board, which contacted Fred Weber. It cost the company about $200,000 to lay the pipe and do the other work necessary, and the school district paid about $100,000 to retro-fit a group of boilers to accept the gas, says Jim Siervo, director of facilities for the district.
The cost to Pattonville was worth it. Siervo says the district saves about $25,000 a year in heating costs by using methane rather than natural gas. Before connecting the pipe to Pattonville, Fred Weber had been burning off the gas.
“This was a way to put it to some use,” says Thomas E. Barta, executive vice president.
To be a good candidate for this sort of project, Siervo said the building must be located near a landfill. For that reason, no other Pattonville school uses methane gas.
“Some colleges use methane gas for heating, but I think we’re the only high school,” Siervo says. |
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