“I work at Doster Construction and we were the project manager for the renovation of the Van Antwerp building. I thought I would go into sales when I went to college, but went to Vietnam and built and repaired bridges. That is how I got into construction. The difference was over there, we had no budgets and thousands of men, here there are budgets, accounting, legal, and many more restrictions. The Van Antwerp building is the first skyscraper in Mobile and the first reinforced concrete high-rise in the Southeast. It was finished in 1908. There was a pharmacy with a soda fountain and almost every doctor and dentist was down here. It was an important building for a long time, but there were tough times in the ’80s and the Van Antwerp family sold it in the ’90s. RSA bought it for not much and put a lot of money into the renovation. Thank goodness they did because you couldn’t tear a building like this down. The bones were good but dilapidated. They completely gutted it. There is now air conditioning and multiple bathrooms on all floors. The state made us take off all of the cornices so we had to replace those. We saved and fixed everything we could. We had to remake some of the terra cotta tiles, replaced the mortar joints and put galvanized steel lintels on every floor. The whole building is on a granite curb. They built this right.  All of the ceilings have been restored and hand-painted. Look at the ornateness. I like to show this building off now. It is a great place to watch Mardi Gras parades on Royal Street and on the roof you can see forever. I grew up in Schenectady, New York, and the Van Antwerp family was the premiere family there. I went to Van Antwerp Jr. High, but never met any of them. The family split in 1895 and half came here. I went from not knowing any of them to knowing a lot of them. Their building is probably the last one I will do. It is getting close to time to retire but I am not sure what I will do next.”