A Glimpse into Our History
In the opening years of the 20th century, Bedford County native William Benjamin “W.B.” English traveled around the state, constructing utility buildings for the Virginian Railroad. When he got the assignment to construct a station in the newly settled town of Altavista, he and his wife decided to call the young community home.
English continued to take on new and larger projects for the railroad, and in 1909, he started his own lumber company to supply raw materials for his construction work. English Construction was born.
Like most other businesses in the nation, English felt the strain of the Great Depression. His two sons, “Red” and Curtis, soon joined him in the business and brought new vitality to the enterprise.
With the outbreak of WWII, the construction work took a different path through the construction of military housing and other defense-related projects. In the postwar baby boom years, English Construction anticipated the need for the rapid construction of new schools, and the company was responsible for building dozens of neighborhood schools throughout the region.
The postwar years also saw an “explosion” in the construction of roadways and public utility plants to serve America’s growing suburbs, and English rode those waves as well. In the closing decades of the 20th century, English applied its broad experience to new fields, including bridges and factories.
Today, in its second century of service, English stands as one of the leading privately held contractors in the mid-Atlantic region—with the workforce, equipment fleet, and bonding capacity needed to tackle truly monumental projects.