Shea Homes Founder Edmund H. Shea, Jr. Passes Away at 80 - Chapter 3
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Shea personally overlooked many of J. F. Shea Co.'s most noteworthy construction projects, building tunnels--including the Berkeley Hills tunnel--and below ground train stations for the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District and the Washington D.C. Metro systems.
J. F. Shea Construction continued to be among the nation's leading underground contractors. Its dynamic public works projects include two chief subway ventures in New York City: the addition to the No. 7 line from Times Square to the Javits Center and the Second Avenue subway. In 2009, it completed the last segment of Metropolitan Water District's Inland Feeder Project, a tunnel all the way through the San Bernardino mountain range.
Back in the late 1960s J. F. Shea started a homebuilding company that adopted the name Shea Homes in 1974. Since its initiation, Shea Homes has constructed and sold upwards of 20,000 houses in California, Arizona, Colorado, Washington, Nevada, and Florida. Builder Magazine in 2008 placed Shea Homes as the biggest for-profit private homebuilder in the country. The Shea family also possesses and manages Shea Properties, which develops, owns, and oversees commercial real estate ventures, such as shopping centers, apartments, and office units in Colorado, Arizona, and California.
Edmund Hill Shea, Jr. was born August 15, 1929 in Portland, Oregon. In his early years, he lived in the San Francisco Bay Area where his father managed the construction project for the piers of the Golden Gate Bridge. In 1935, his family moved back to Los Angeles. He attended Loyola High School, where he graduated in 1947.
After attending the Jesuit Novitiate and then at Santa Clara University, he enrolled in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he graduated with a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering in 1952. He joined the United States Air Force for two years, which included a crash course in electrical engineering. He later gave credit to that opportunity for giving him the knowledge he needed to appreciate the worth of the integrated circuit and other technological innovations that he invested in right around the 1970s.
J. F. Shea Construction continued to be among the nation's leading underground contractors. Its dynamic public works projects include two chief subway ventures in New York City: the addition to the No. 7 line from Times Square to the Javits Center and the Second Avenue subway. In 2009, it completed the last segment of Metropolitan Water District's Inland Feeder Project, a tunnel all the way through the San Bernardino mountain range.
Back in the late 1960s J. F. Shea started a homebuilding company that adopted the name Shea Homes in 1974. Since its initiation, Shea Homes has constructed and sold upwards of 20,000 houses in California, Arizona, Colorado, Washington, Nevada, and Florida. Builder Magazine in 2008 placed Shea Homes as the biggest for-profit private homebuilder in the country. The Shea family also possesses and manages Shea Properties, which develops, owns, and oversees commercial real estate ventures, such as shopping centers, apartments, and office units in Colorado, Arizona, and California.
Edmund Hill Shea, Jr. was born August 15, 1929 in Portland, Oregon. In his early years, he lived in the San Francisco Bay Area where his father managed the construction project for the piers of the Golden Gate Bridge. In 1935, his family moved back to Los Angeles. He attended Loyola High School, where he graduated in 1947.
After attending the Jesuit Novitiate and then at Santa Clara University, he enrolled in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he graduated with a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering in 1952. He joined the United States Air Force for two years, which included a crash course in electrical engineering. He later gave credit to that opportunity for giving him the knowledge he needed to appreciate the worth of the integrated circuit and other technological innovations that he invested in right around the 1970s.
