JOLIET — It’s been more than a year sinceJoliet Patch reported that the Our Lady of Angels retirement home, a shining star in the Joliet community since around 1960, had closed its doors forever. The property has remained vacant ever since.
However, Gould Construction has started to dismantle and destroy Our Lady Of Angels buildings. The demolition work began last week.
“It’s the biggest demolition we’ve ever done,” remarked Greg Gould of Gould Construction.
Gould estimated the demolition of Our Lady of Angels will take another three or four months.
He said that Gould was originally supposed to begin the demolition in January, however, the project was delayed for several months because Com-Ed had to disconnect all the electricity and utilities throughout the sprawling retirement home campus.
Gould said his own family has a personal connection to the Our Lady of Angels retirement home, as family members had worked there over the years.
“It’s been a big part of Joliet,” he said.
Why will the demolition take roughly four months?
“It’s just big, that’s about it,” Gould explained. “There’s nothing hard about it.”
Gould said the property remains secured with the chain link fence surrounding the entire property to keep vandals and trespassers away.
Aside from the fact that all the furniture was taken out of OLA, “it looks nothing different,” Gould said.
Our Lady of Angels retirement home has been at 1201 Wyoming Avenue on Joliet’s west side since 1960. In November 2022, Sister Jeanne Bessette, president of Our Lady of Angels Retirement Home, announced that the Joliet retirement home will be permanently closed by March 2023.
It turned out that all the residents have been moved out of Our Lady of Angels in January 2023 and one final Mass of Thanksgiving on the property, on Saturday, Feb. 11, 2023.
The Sisters of St. Francis of Mary Immaculate were responsible for selecting Gould Construction for the demolition project.
So far, the Sisters of St. Francis of Mary remain in control of the Our Lady of Angels property near Ingalls Avenue.
Although there has been talk about Joliet Catholic Academy acquiring the property, since it’s adjacent to their athletic fields and campus, that has not happened.
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Meanwhile, Joliet Patch has left a message with Ryan Quigley, Joliet Catholic Academy’s director of Institutional Advancement, to find out whether JCA is still interested in acquiring the Our Lady of Angels property, or whether JCA has abandoned those efforts given its lack of success in reaching an agreement with the Sisters of St. Francis, so far.
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