The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-06-13
WHAT ONE MAN GAN DO IN TEN MONTHS I. C. 1hOmpSon'S Great Work
 In Birmingham WORLDS RECORDS BROKEN Few Realize What It Means For One Man to Build Empire and
 Chamber of Commerce at
 Same Time.
WORLDS RECORDS BROKEN
BY c, M, STANLEY.

N'4aAASS' what lleH must they In1nk or T. c. Thompson, a Birmingham man to the core, who can in less than a year break worlds records in the construction of the 16-story Empire building and put up the Birmingham Chamber of Com merce building as a side liner Few real ize perhaps what this man has done in the last few months in the way of human endeavor The old structure at the cor her of First avenue and Twentieth street was pulled down November 1.
 Do you know what has been done on that corner since that date?
 Twenty-Five hundred wagon loads of dirt have been excavated and hauled away.
 Fifteen hunded wagon loads of rock have been blasted out and hauled away.
 One million, two hundred and fifty thousand common brick and 250, 900 pressed brick have been laid
 Twelve hundred tons of structural steel has been put in place.
 An average of 250 men per day has been employed.
 And the erection of the Empire build ing has been uphill pushing all the way.
 
 to be taken out of the entire rear portion of the site. Tn front the rock was so uneven that the excavations had to be carried 75 feet below the surface to get solid rock base and in one of the caissons just as the workmen were about to reach the rock a stream of water as big as mans leg rushed in and big pumps had to be worked night and day One day the pump broke and the water rose and covered up the machinery. Another day the earth caved where the water had loos- ened 1t. It took exactly car load of cement to fill up this hole. It was in these days that MT. Thompson had his big force of men working night and day to get the foundation work completed on contract time.
 But with all these difficulties MT. Thompson got ready for his steel struc- tural men who began work on March 1T. In 23 days exactly they had hoisted the flag at the top of the sixteenth floor an nouncing that the top was reached and 29 days was the best record ever made before in the world on this size build ing.
 And then came the terra cotta and brick and stone men. And how they did hustle MT. Thompson spared no expense to put in devices to facilitate the work He built an outside scaffold for the material men. He installed a splendid swinging scaffold never before seen in the south in which 10000 feet of %-inch cable was used An extra outside elevator with steel cable guys was installed to get the brick and other materials to the upper floors in hurry.
 Not satisfied with beginning the brick and ceramic work at the ground and work simultaneously on the ground and the fifth floors and a little later put crew to work at a still higher level.
 As a result all of the masonry, in- cluding the terra cotta, was finished on June 1. That was going some, wasn't 1t? MT. Thompson says the building will be ready for tenants September 1, the date originally set. How is that for ten months work?
 But look at the Chamber of Com merce, He did that, too, at the same time he was doing the other. It is big building itself and is as much as the average man would want to tackle for a years work.
 But Mr. Thompson Is a man of big things. He has been doing them for years, ever since he came to Birmingham from South Carolina with his father in 1871. He has tried to g1ve up the con tracting business but simply cannot. Dur ing the panic of 93, when things were so dull in Birmingham, he went to New York and opened up offices there. But three years was enough so far away from home and he came back to Birming- ham and has been making this the seat of his extensive operations ever since. There are only two or three men in Bir- mingham now living who came to Bir- mingham before MT. Thompson and one of them got here only day ahead be- cause MT. Thompson's father camped over night near where Avondale now stands and entered the place where Birmingham was some day to be next day.
 Mr. Thompson built the nine-story Title Guarantee building in Birmingham which was no small job itself. He is old enough in the business to be the builder of the old building which was recently torn away to make room for the Farley build ing.
 He built the Olympia cotton mills at Columbia, s. c. He built the Cannon mills and Patterson mills at Annapolis N C. He built the Arlington hotel at Hot Springs, Ark, and the West Tennes- see insane asylum at Bolivar, Tenn, While he was in New York he built num- erous churches. But after all, the list Is as long as his eventual life. And don't you think the Empire, rearing its 240 feet on Birmingham sky line, is fitting climax to this active record of achieve ment? But he seems good for many moro years and there is no telling what he win be doing next.