15. Ed O’Brien

Ed O’Brien left Buffalo, New York in 1978 with his wife Betty and their 5 kids (who all currently live in the metroplex) and moved into their present home in Duncanville to pursue his own business. Starting with a washer and dryer in his garage (which Betty wasn’t so much in favor of) Ed built his industrial uniform cleaning business and soon thereafter had his own building in Cedar Hill. In 1999 he joined the Knights at the urging of Ron Suraino and following the chain of command became Grand Knight from July 2004 thru June 2006. “When I joined the Knights I wanted to be the Grand Knight”, Ed said. After joining, Ed became a very active member, joining in the many activities Knights are famous for. “I was not the guy who organized the events, but I was always there working”. Often times his wife was there with him. When he became Grand Knight he continued his furious hard work as he guided the Council through what he called “a calm period”. There was a break in baseball concession revenue during Ed’s tenure so “we did a lot of cooking” and other volunteer labor work. During this period, the Council relied heavily on revenue from the pancake breakfasts to provide funding for the various activities.

One of the emphases during Ed’s reign was to recruit younger members to the Council. During his tenure the Council continued all their charitable works including cook-outs, Corporate Communions, Seminarian support, free throw contest cook-outs at St Joseph’s, Fall Festival set-up and tear down and so on. While it may have been a “calm period” in Ed’s eyes, his leadership and guidance yielded another award as Star Council during his time as Grand Knight. “I was proud to be Grand Knight. It was a special feeling to stand before the group and feel in charge of such a great organization”. Ed gave special thanks to Ron Suriano and Dan Murphy who both men to red him as Grand Knight. Ed is still a very active member of the Knights of this Council and was selected Knight of the year in 2007 and is still an officer today as a Trustee. During his tenure as Grand Knight Dan Murphy and Ross Musso were Knights of the Year.