Dick Castle-Walsh Civil Engineering Scholarship
Dick Castle-Walsh was born February 14, 1932 in New York City. He graduated from Oyster Bay New York High School in 1949 and received a degree in Civil Engineering from the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in 1954. He served as a Lieutenant in the US Army Corps of Engineers stationed in Germany from 1955 to 1956.
When he returned from Germany, Dick went to work at Bethlehem Steel and participated in the Bethlehem Steel 2 year “loop program”, gaining experience in the different product segments of Bethlehem Steel, such as structural steel, reinforcing steel and other steel products. Upon completion of the training program, Dick went to work with the New York City office of Bethlehem Steel selling fabricated reinforcing steel in the New York construction market.
In 1975, Dick was promoted to the Boston office where he sold fabricated reinforcing steel and related products to major accounts in the Boston and New England construction market. Dick retired from Bethlehem Steel in 1986 when Bethlehem sold their fabricated reinforcing steel business. His retirement was short-lived, as Dick was hired in 1986 by Barker Steel Company Inc. in Watertown, Massachusetts where he was later promoted to Vice President of Sales. Dick led the estimating and sales teams at Barker Steel in the 1990s and 2000s in the process of estimating, bidding and securing contracts on major infrastructure projects including much of Boston’s Big Dig – Central Artery/Tunnel (CA/T) Project, Deer Island WWPT and many others. Dick helped lead Barker Steel’s expansion into the New York City markets in the mid-1990s, with a particular focus on high rise and heavy/highway construction.
Dick retired from Barker Steel in 2006 after 20 years of service with Barker Steel and over 50 years of service to the concrete reinforced steel industry. Throughout his career, Dick was a strong proponent of the value added process of relationship selling and was a true master of the “art of the deal.”
Richard Castle-Walsh passed in July of 2020. After his passing, Dick’s family and colleagues established the CRSI Foundation Dick Castle-Walsh Civil Engineering Scholarship to be granted to a junior or senior at VMI who is in the Civil and Environmental Engineering program with a focus in Structural Engineering. Dick always credited his career and focus in life to his time at VMI and the scholarship represents his passion for his craft. His family and colleagues would like for the Dick Castle-Walsh Civil Engineering Scholarship recipient to take full advantage of the opportunities provided by the scholarship and the VMI education.