Original trucks and rental space of Illinois Valley Millwright Services
Illinois Valley Millwright Services Peru location
Founder of IVMS with refurbished IVMS truck
Many customers do not realize the family ties we hold at Machinery Maintenance, Valley Fabrication and On Site Repair. Not only are we a family owned and operated business (moving into our third generation), but we also have a knack for employing many family units. Let’s start with the legacies…
Our Machine Shop Manager, Paul, grew up in the business. He started working at Machinery Maintenance (formally Illinois Valley Millwright) at age 14 alongside his father, Larry, the original machine shop manager. Prior to moving over to IVMS, Larry had his own machine shop. Just as Paul’s father passed along the machine shop to him, Valley Fabrication has a similar story. Barry’s father, Jim, was the original fabrication shop manager. Barry also grew up in the business, starting in his early teens. Today, Barry manages Valley Fabrication and Jim still pops in from time-to-time to check on his work!
You would think two generational legacies like this is enough? Well, we weren’t kidding when we said we have a thing for employing family units. Currently across all three shops, we have one family unit that consists of two brothers, a son, a father-in-law and a brother-in-law…that’s five in case you lost count! In addition to this unit, we have another family set which consists of three brothers – there is a 4th brother so we’ll probably start pushing for him soon so we can complete the unit!
Finally, last month we hired a third-generation machinist. His grandfather, father and now him have all been employed by Machinery Maintenance at some point. Get the Kleenex for the next part, this third-generation machinist, unknowingly set-up shop in his grandfather’s area and is using his tool cart! What are the chances? Pretty good if you’re working here.
So, when we say we are a family, we mean it (figuratively and literally). The years of experience and knowledge passed down through the MMI, VFI and OSR family is next to none. We are able to handle some of our customers toughest jobs because of our long-standing history in their facilities and our unique knowledge which is passed down from generation to generation.
”I have to do everything around here."
J. Cole (1956 - 2019)27 year MMI Employee
