In 1930, something happened in Indiana that still amazes engineers today.
The Indiana Bell Telephone Building—all 22 million pounds of it—needed to be moved to make room for expansion. But instead of tearing it down, they did something incredible:
They moved the entire building. All 8 stories, made of brick and steel, were shifted 52 feet south and rotated 90 degrees. It took 34 days. But here’s the part that sounds like science fiction:
The building never stopped operating.
As the skyscraper inched along, engineers kept water, gas, electricity, and phone lines connected. Inside, 600 employees kept working—answering calls, filing papers, holding meetings—completely unfazed by the slow-motion miracle happening beneath them.
No CGI. No giant cranes. Just hydraulic jacks, hand-operated rollers, and pure 1930s ingenuity.
It’s such a brilliant feat, it almost seems made up. But it really happened—an engineering ballet that shows the past had its own kind of magic.