We Mean Business. Illinois Business.
 
 

Hauler turned design-builder develops Granite City corridor
By KURT PRENZLER

   GRANITE - Darryl Slater, owner of Dial Properties in Granite City, looks at least 10 years younger than his 57 years. To what does he attribute his youthful appearance? "Water," he said. "Both drinking it and swimming in it."

   Slater's life as an entrepreneur began naturally enough at his family's dining room table. His parents moved to St. Louis from Kankakee in the late 1930s when William Slater, his father, took a job with a St. Louis trucking company. In less than a year, William had started his own company, M. C. Slater Inc., naming it after his wife, Mildred Catherine Slater. The trucking firm focused on hauling steel between St. Louis and Chicago as well as Gary, Ind.

   In 1957, Slater began junior high at Western Military Academy in Alton, where he graduated from high school. The business owner credits WMA as a major influence in his life.

   "WMA was small enough for me to write for the school newspaper, play sports and explore many things," he said. "And by the way, the first U.S. Navy Ace of World War II, Edward 'Butch' O'Hare, graduated from WMA. Chicago O'Hare International airport is named after him. Unfortunately, WMA closed in 1971, during the Vietnam era."

   After graduating from Central Methodist College in Fayette, Mo., and completing one year of graduate work at the University of Tennessee, Slater was drafted by the U.S. Army in 1968. He spent most of 1969 in Cam Rahn Bay, South Vietnam, in logistics, as a liaison for troops arriving in Vietnam.

   "After returning from Vietnam," Slater said, "I began working with my family's trucking firm. In early 1971, our 40-year-old vice president of operations died tragically in a car accident and I had to replace him. Three years later, I became president of the company. At that time, we were running 95 trucks."

   But the trucking business changed dramatically with deregulation in 1980.

   "Many of our hauls were simply not profitable anymore," Slater said. "We held a family meeting. My dad and my brother, Donald, wanted to continue the business, but I decided to step down and do something else."

   That something else became Dial Properties.

   "I built my first building in 1984 and leased it on a long-term basis," the entrepreneur said. "That was the first of six projects on Dial Drive, about a half mile southeast of the intersection of Interstate 270 and Illinois Route 3."

   In 1988, at the age of 42, Slater enrolled in night classes in Washington University's architectural technology program, from which he received his second bachelor's degree in 1997.

   Slater's most recent project is an office building for Hydrochem Industrial Services at 5520 Dial Drive.

   "What I really enjoy is working with clients to achieve their goals," he said. "The design-build concept fits me like a glove. I'm fortunate to be doing something that I really enjoy. And I don't plan to retire."

   Slater lives in Edwardsville with Fran, his wife of 28 years, and their two children, Lindsey, 18, and Warren, 13.