Published: June 06, 2009 12:23 am      

With little experience, retired Army officer builds apartment

BERLIN — Following orders and instructions are nothing new to a career military man.

After retiring from a 22-year career in the Army with the rank of lieutenant colonel, Terry DePhillips of Berlin decided to build an apartment above his three-car garage despite his limited construction experience.

When he found he didn’t have the construction know-how, DePhillips got his orders from an arsenal of how-to books and followed them to the letter.

He also took classes in building codes at Somerset County Technology Center to keep his new apartment in line with current standards.

“I’ve never done anything like this, but I’ve always tinkered,” said DePhillips, who is 64.

When DePhillips bought a home in Berlin in 1989, he cut his construction teeth on upgrading the electric service, putting in insulation and replacing the horsehair plaster.

After his garage was completed in 2003, DePhillips had the builders construct a shell above it and took it from there.

“I had the garage built to house my toys, then I decided it wouldn’t cost that much more to keep going up and add an apartment,” DePhillips said.

“My wife, Sandy, and I plan to live here after selling our house.”

DePhillips designed the details of the apartment himself, and his wife designed the kitchen.

He then went to 84 Lumber and Lowe’s in Somerset, where specifications were drawn up using computer software.

The only things in the apartment DePhillips didn’t install are the granite countertops in the kitchen, which were special ordered and installed by a Bedford County company.

“Other than that, every 2x6, nail, screw, lighting and plumbing fixture and piece of drywall, I did,” said DePhillips, who has worked on the project for five years. “I told my wife it would be done on the 12th of never, so we call it neverland.”

He also installed the kitchen cabinets, which were purchased at Lowe’s, by himself.

DePhillips planned the layout of his garage and apartment like a military strategist, allowing three feet between garage doors so both vehicle doors and occupants have plenty of room and installing numerous quad outlets in every room for any possible electronic emergency.

The apartment as well as the garage will be kept warm by radiant heating that DePhillips installed in the floors.

The insulation in the apartment walls is double stuffed because DePhillips had to use two sets of 2x4s to bring it up to code.

To keep from losing half his floor space to support beams, DePhillips had a 48-foot steel beam installed down the center of the garage ceiling, losing only four feet of space in the apartment above.

He also stained and installed all the baseboards and trim work.

The apartment includes pocket doors, Italian tile floors, a Jacuzzi tub in the second bathroom and windows that follow the line of the gambrel roof.

“It’s amazing it all works,” DePhillips said.

Because he works on cars, DePhillips installed a lift in his garage, where he plans to restore a 1955 Thunderbird.

He also plans to add a deck to his garage-apartment complex.

Originally from Somerset, DePhillips played high school football with the 1962 undefeated Eagles before receiving a scholarship to Washington and Jefferson College, where he was a math major and joined the Army ROTC.

“I never planned to go to college,” DePhillips said. “My dad and uncles leased a house coal mine where they went in on their hands and knees with picks and shovels. I worked with them from the time I was 12 or 13. We sold coal door to door.”

After graduating from Washington and Jefferson, DePhillips received a direct commission into the Army and was sent to Vietnam in 1966, serving in the artillery on a fire base.

“I signed up for three years active duty and ended up making it a career,” he said. “It was the best possible decision. I had some great jobs and met some fantastic people. The best job I ever had was a battalion commander over 1,100 troops at Fort Bliss.”

DePhillips also served two tours of duty in the office of the Secretary of Defense at the Pentagon and was project manager for several projects elsewhere.

At Fort Meade, across from the Pentagon, he worked on a contract for unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, and in Philadelphia, he worked on a contract for former President Ronald Reagan’s “‘Star Wars” program.

Serving in the Army earned DePhillips an all-expenses-paid trip to graduate school in California, where he received a master’s degree as a systems analyst.

After he retired in 1988, DePhillips worked for Colsa Corp., a defense contractor headquartered in Huntsville, Ala., for 12 years, and spent some time in Saudi Arabia.

DePhillips met his second wife in November 1978 while he was stationed at Fort Lewis in Seattle and she was working as a secretary for the Army Research Institute in El Paso, Texas.

“Thirty days later we were married,” Sandy DePhilips said.

DePhillips and his wife each have three children, and there are eight grandchildren.