The Eiffel Tower
Bobbi Hope Schragal
Professor HollidayENGL 1550 CRN #45054
26 September 2014
The Cultural Icon of the Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower is one of the most attracted architectural icons in the world. This structure was not meant to be permanent, in fact it was only intended to be a temporary exhibit. The tower was built with exquisite arch features made out of iron that was admired for its pleasing symmetry. The statistics behind the Eiffel tower are intriguing. The Eiffel Tower achieved the historical record for being the world’s tallest building up until 1931. The Tower was also used as a monumental antenna and intercepted German radio communications during the First World War. Lastly, not only was the tower built with exquisite architecture and used as a monumental antenna, but the tower was also used as a laboratory for scientific measurements and experiments.
For the Universal Exhibition of 1889, a date that marked the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution, the Journal Officiel launched a major competition to construct an iron tower on the Champ-de-Mars. In Paris, Alan Tillier gave specific measurements on the qualifications of the constructed structure. He went on to explain how the requirement for the structure was to have a square base that was 125 meters on each side and 300 meters high (190) there were One Hundred and Seven people wanting to compete in this competition. Between One Hundred and Seven people the top four people chosen included entrepreneur Gustave Eiffel, engineers Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier and architect Stephen Sauvestre (192). When unveiled at the Paris World’s Fair, the Eiffel Tower was the tallest man made structure in the world. When constructing the Tower, fifty engineers and designers produced 5,300 drawings, and over 100 workers built more than 18,000 different parts of the tower in Eiffel’s factory on the outskirts of Paris. On site, 132 workers assembled the pieces of the Tower. The Eiffel Tower was constructed
Professor HollidayENGL 1550 CRN #45054
26 September 2014
The Cultural Icon of the Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower is one of the most attracted architectural icons in the world. This structure was not meant to be permanent, in fact it was only intended to be a temporary exhibit. The tower was built with exquisite arch features made out of iron that was admired for its pleasing symmetry. The statistics behind the Eiffel tower are intriguing. The Eiffel Tower achieved the historical record for being the world’s tallest building up until 1931. The Tower was also used as a monumental antenna and intercepted German radio communications during the First World War. Lastly, not only was the tower built with exquisite architecture and used as a monumental antenna, but the tower was also used as a laboratory for scientific measurements and experiments.
For the Universal Exhibition of 1889, a date that marked the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution, the Journal Officiel launched a major competition to construct an iron tower on the Champ-de-Mars. In Paris, Alan Tillier gave specific measurements on the qualifications of the constructed structure. He went on to explain how the requirement for the structure was to have a square base that was 125 meters on each side and 300 meters high (190) there were One Hundred and Seven people wanting to compete in this competition. Between One Hundred and Seven people the top four people chosen included entrepreneur Gustave Eiffel, engineers Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier and architect Stephen Sauvestre (192). When unveiled at the Paris World’s Fair, the Eiffel Tower was the tallest man made structure in the world. When constructing the Tower, fifty engineers and designers produced 5,300 drawings, and over 100 workers built more than 18,000 different parts of the tower in Eiffel’s factory on the outskirts of Paris. On site, 132 workers assembled the pieces of the Tower. The Eiffel Tower was constructed
Cited: Desmons, Gilles. Walking Paris: 30 Original Walks in and around Paris. London: New Holland, 2008. Print. Gerrard, Mike, and Donna Dailey. Top 10 Paris. New York: DK Pub., 2008. Print. Nevez, Catherine Le, Christopher Pitts, and Nicola Williams. Discover Paris: Experience the Best of Paris. Footscray, Vic.: Lonely Planet, 2013. Print. Strachan, Hew. The Oxford Illustrated History of the First World War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. Print. Tillier, Alan. Paris. New York, NY: DK Pub., 2012. Print.