Topham, an English fireplug who was five feet ten and weighed two hundred pounds, could bendiron pokers with his bare hands, roll pewter dishes into cannoli, and win a tug-of-war with a horse.
He pointed specifically to projects in Alabama that have received federal monies: a ferry in Gee's Bend that restarted service in 2006, and a 56-foot-tall cast-iron statue of Vulcan, the Roman god of the fire and forge, in Birmingham.