ASPHALTopics | Summer 2014 | VOL 27 | NO3

Special
Profile
Eddie DeToro,
founder of OHMPA
and first president
by Steve Pecar
It wasn’t Eddie DeToro’s intention to get into the family
business. He had other plans. Growing up in Toronto’s
west end, his interests were varied enough to stay
away from his father John DeToro’s Advance Concrete
Contracting Company. “I had interests in other areas,”
he explains from the comfort of his Richmond Hill home.
“My mother knew it too. She didn’t think that type of
construction work was for me.”
Through his diligence DeToro quickly made his own
mark and by 1950, at the age of 21, became the youngest
person ever to become a certified Licenced Electrician
in Toronto. “I knew my stuff and I really liked that career,
being an electrician,” he explains. But the inevitable was
waiting around the corner. Eventually his father convinced
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him to join his company. He tried it, and as they say,
the rest is history.
Those early days were marked with the back-breaking
work of the construction industry with a pick and shovel
being the earliest tools of the trade. He says that even
though he was the son of the boss, his father felt young
Eddie had to know all aspects of the business and that
meant getting his hands dirty.
“You cannot tell someone what to do unless you have
done it yourself” was one of his father John’s favourite
expressions. “It was tough, but it was good advice from
my father,” he says now. “I ran my own crew – we started
small, but I learned and we grew.”
The senior DeToro caught on early that the future of
paving was in hot mix asphalt and quickly left behind the
use of concrete. The purchase of an asphalt plant in North
York sealed their commitment to the
technology and Eddie soon took on
more responsibilities. The road where
that first plant was located, Toro
Road, is named after the family.
Soon he started to take on more
administrative responsibility for the
company. “I was also around to do
a little electrical work,” he laughs.
“Those skills would always come in
handy. A few times I was able to keep
things running at the plant because
of my background as an electrician.”
DeToro admits that up until the early
1970s, there wasn’t a lot of discussion
about an association for hot mix
paving contractors. They needed
a common objective to pull them
together as they were all running in
a different direction, but with the
same common problems. So when
the first meeting was called, he really
didn’t know what he was getting
into or what doors he was opening.
Sure, he knew the bind that he was
in. Everybody in the asphalt industry
was up against it. But as president
of his company, he was used to
going it alone.