A second Silver Trowel was awarded in that category. Serretta Construction of Apopka, Fla., placed a 288,660-square-foot project at the Rooms to Go Distribution Center in Lakeland, Fla., that measured FF 89 / FL 52, virtually the same F-Numbers as Messerly’s, and good enough to win a gold plate Golden Trowel only a few years ago.

Birdwell took home another Silver Trowel in the Somero Laser Screed wide bay (small project) category at the Orangeburg Assembly Hall in Orangeburg, S.C.. The F-Numbers for this 47,680-square-foot project were FF 107 / FL 60.

The 2012 Sam Award was present to Cecil Bentley for his decades of contributions to the
concrete flooring industry as an award-winning contractor, flooring consultant and author of numerous technical publications. The “Sam” is a special Golden Trowel that honors outstanding accomplishments in and contributions to the art and science of high quality horizontal concrete construction. The “Sam” is named in honor of Samuel A. Face, Jr. (1923-2001), the late Chairman of The Face Companies. It has been awarded each year since 2002. Bentley who, as the owner and president of Tri-Bentley Constructors, Inc. from 1970 to 1995, worked on projects with Sam Face and was an early adopter of both the F-Number System and the placement and finishing techniques that Sam Face developed in the 1970s and 80s.

Tri-Bentley was one of the Southeast’s largest concrete construction firms specializing in
multiprocessing plants, warehouses, distribution centers, office buildings, shopping centers and other facilities. Late in his career at Tri-Bentley, he was selected to participate in the concrete construction of the 1996 Olympic Aquatic Center at Georgia Tech as well as to install the Slabs on Metal Deck for the construction of the 1996 Olympic Stadium.

For the last 17 years, Bentley has served as a consultant to the concrete construction industry with Lockwood Greene Engineers and Architects and, for the last 12 years, with Structural Services, Inc.

He has co-authored technical papers for the American Concrete Institute publication Concrete International in 2006, 2007 and 2010 and for ACI’s Concrete Construction in 2007 and 2010.

Bentley has been an ACI member for 27 years. He is a member of ACI Committee C-640
“Craftsman Certification” and has been an examiner for ACI’s Concrete Flatwork
Finisher/Technician Certification Program since 1997.

He has won numerous awards from the ACI state chapter in Georgia and his Tri-Bentley
Constructors won a Golden Trowel Award in recognition of the Flattest & Most Level Concrete Floor Slabs of 1990 for the construction of several superflat floors in a warehouse facility for E.I. Du Pont de Nemours. That Golden Trowel was personally awarded to Bentley by Sam Face, 22 years ago.