As a kind of high-efficiency transportation tools, tower cranes are widely used in construction site. With the increasing volume and mass of payload being transported, the researches of distributed mass payload (DMP) problems have been paid more and more attentions. However, most of the existing control algorithms designed for the concentrated mass payload (CMP) are not enough to meet the needs of actual production. The difference between DMP and CMP is mainly manifested in that the remaining payload swing caused by inertial torque of DMP cannot be effectively suppressed, which leads to safety hazards. In addition, due to the different working environment, accurate system parameters (such as mechanical frictions, air frictions ) are hard to obtain, which leads to errors in their positioning. To solve the above issues, first, we establish mathematical model of a double-pendulum tower crane with distributed mass payload (DTCDMP) and carry out dynamic analysis. Then we propose a fuzzy adaptive control method, which has a good tracking effect against external disturbances and parameter uncertainties, and the method can achieve accurate positioning and effective anti-swing. Then, the Lyapunov technology and LaSalle's invariance principle are used to rigorously prove the stability of the system. Finally, on the basis of tracking the S-shaped trajectories, the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed controller are verified through multi-group comparative experiments.