Eiffel by Guth, 1889
The main structural work was completed at the end of March,
and on the 31st Eiffel celebrated this by leading a group of government
officials, accompanied by representatives of the press, to the top of the
tower. Since the lifts were not yet in operation, the ascent was made by foot,
and took over an hour, Eiffel frequently stopping to make explanations of
various features. Most of the party chose to stop at the lower levels, but a
few, including Nouguier, Compagnon, the President of the City Council and
reporters from Le Figaro and Le Monde Illustré completed the climb. At 2.35
Eiffel hoisted a large tricolor, to the accompaniment of a 25-gun salute fired
from the lower level.
By June construction had reached the second level platform,
and on Bastille Day this was used for a fireworks display, and Eiffel held a
celebratory banquet for the press on the first level platform.
The Panama Scandal
In 1887, Eiffel became involved with the French effort to
construct a canal across the Panama Isthmus. The French Panama Canal Company,
headed by Ferdinand de Lesseps, had been attempting to build a sea-level canal
but came to the realization that this was impractical. The plan was changed to
one using locks, which Eiffel was contracted to design and build. The locks
were on a large scale, most having a change of level of 11 m (36 ft). Eiffel had been working on the project for
little more than a year when the company suspended payments of interest on 14
December 1888, and shortly afterwards was put into liquidation. Eiffel's
reputation was badly damaged when he was implicated in the financial and
political scandal which followed. Although he was simply a contractor, he was
charged along with the directors of the project with raising money under false
pretenses and misappropriation of funds. On 9 February 1893, Eiffel was found
guilty on the charge of misuse of funds, and was fined 20,000 francs and sentenced
to two years in prison, although he was acquitted on appeal. The later American-built canal used new lock
designs (see History of the Panama Canal).
Shortly after the trial Eiffel had announced his intention
to resign from the Board of Directors of the Compagnie des Etablissements
Eiffel, and he did so at a General Meeting held on 14 February, saying: "I
have absolutely decided to abstain from any participation in any manufacturing
business from now on, and so that no one can be misled and to make it most
evident that I intend to remain absolutely uninvolved with the management of
the establishments which bear my name, I insist that my name should disappear
from the name of the company." The
company changed its name to La Société Constructions Levallois-Perret, with
Maurice Koechlin as managing director. The name was changed to the Anciens Etablissements
Eiffel in 1937.
Later career
About six months after his retirement from the Compagnie des
Etablissements Eiffel, Eiffel was approached by Felix-Max Richard, owner of the
Comptoir General de Photographie. Felix-Max Richard had just lost a lawsuit
against him by his brother to enforce a noncompetition agreement. Felix-Max
Richard appealed the decision but felt he needed a back-up plan if his appeal
was denied. On May 28, 1895, the court denied the appeal and Gustave Eiffel
bought the Comptoir with three other men: Joseph Vallot, Alfred Besnier, and
Leon Gaumont, who was thirty years his junior. The company was renamed L.
Gaumont et Cie after its youngest partner because Eiffel did not want his name
on the company. Leon Gaumont was manager and Eiffel was president from 1895
through 1906. The company went public in January 1907 and is one of the oldest
motion picture companies in the world.
During those years, Eiffel guided the company, contributed
to its capital investments and inventions, and was absorbed by the new
technologies and decisions the company made in its first eleven years. In 1897,
he collaborated with Louis-Paul Cailletet and Leon Gaumont on a motion picture
camera that was installed in a hot-air balloon. According to the correspondence
between Gaumont and Eiffel, Eiffel had dark rooms at his Beauleau-Sur-Mer and
Vevey vacation homes where he experimented with chemical developers. He
patented a photographic heliograph in 1907.
He went on to do important work in meteorology and
aerodynamics. Eiffel's interest in these
areas was a consequence of the problems he had encountered with the effects of
wind forces on the structures he had built.
His first aerodynamic experiments, an investigation of the
air resistance of surfaces, was carried out by dropping the surface to be
investigated together with a measuring apparatus down a vertical cable stretched
between the second level of the Eiffel Tower and the ground. Using this Eiffel
definitely established that the air resistance of a body was very closely
related to the square of the airspeed. He then built a laboratory on the Champ
de Mars at the foot of the tower in 1905, building his first wind tunnel there
in 1909. The wind tunnel was used to investigate the characteristics of the
airfoil sections used by the early pioneers of aviation such as the Wright
Brothers, Gabriel Voisin and Louis Blériot. Eiffel established that the lift
produced by an airfoil was the result of a reduction of air pressure above the
wing rather than an increase of pressure acting on the under surface. Following
complaints about noise from people living nearby, he moved his experiments to a
new establishment at Auteuil in 1912. Here it was possible to build a larger
wind tunnel, and Eiffel began to make tests using scale models of aircraft
designs. In 1913 Eiffel was awarded the
Samuel P. Langley Medal for Aerodromics by the Smithsonian Institution. In his
speech at the presentation of the medal, Alexander Graham Bell said:
... his writings upon the resistance of the
air have already become classical. His researches, published in 1907 and 1911,
on the resistance of the air in connection with aviation, are especially
valuable. They have given engineers the data for designing and constructing
flying machines upon sound, scientific principles
Eiffel had meteorological measuring equipment placed on the
tower in 1889, and also built a weather station at his house in Sèvres. Between
1891 and 1892 he compiled a complete set of meteorological readings, and later
extended his record-taking to include measurements from 25 different locations
across France.
Eiffel died on 27 December 1923, while listening to
Beethoven's 5th Symphony, Second movement Andante, in his mansion on Rue
Rabelais in Paris, France. He was buried in the family tomb in Levallois-Perret
Cemetery.
Influence
Gustave Eiffel's career was facilitated by the Industrial
Revolution. For a variety of economic and political reasons, this had been slow
to make an impact in France, and Eiffel
had the good fortune to be working at a time of rapid industrial development in
France. Eiffel's importance as an engineer was twofold. Firstly he was ready to
adopt innovative techniques first used by others, such as his use of
compressed-air caissons and hollow cast-iron piers, and secondly he was a
pioneer in his insistence on basing all engineering decisions on thorough
calculation of the forces involved, combining this analytical approach with an
insistence on a high standard of accuracy in drawing and manufacture.
The growth of the railway network had an immense effect on
people's lives, but although the enormous number of bridges and other work
undertaken by Eiffel were an important part of this, the two works that did
most to make him famous are the Statue of Liberty and the Eiffel Tower, both
projects of immense symbolic importance and today internationally recognized
landmarks. The Tower is also important because of its role in establishing the
aesthetic potential of structures whose appearance is largely dictated by
practical considerations.
His contribution to the science of aerodynamics is probably
of equal importance to his work as an engineer.
Works
Buildings and
structures
Cathedral of San Pedro de Tacna, Peru.
The "Grand Hotel Traian" from Iaşi, is Gustave
Eiffel's link to Romania
Konak Pier in İzmir, Turkey, designed by Gustave Eiffel
Railway station at Toulouse, France (1862)
Railway station at Agen, France.
Church of Notre Dame des Champs, Paris (1867)
Performing Artes Center Lía Bermúdez, Maracaibo, Venezuela
(1886)
Synagogue in Rue de Pasarelles, Paris (1867)
Théâtre les Folies, Paris (1868)
Gasworks, La Paz, Bolivia (1873)
Gasworks, Tacna, Peru (1873)
Church of San Marcos, Arica, Chile (1875)
Cathedral of San Pedro de Tacna, Peru (1875)
Lycée Carnot, Paris (1876)
Budapest-Nyugati Pályaudvar (Western railway station),
Budapest, Hungary (1877)
Ornamental Fountain of the Three Graces, Moquegua, Peru
(1877)
Ruhnu Lighthouse at
Ruhnu Island, Estonia (1877)
Grand Hotel Traian, Iași, Romania (1882)
Nice Observatory, Nice, France (1886)
Statue of Liberty, Liberty Island, New York City, United
States (1886)
Colbert Bridge, Dieppe, France (1888)
Eiffel Tower, Paris, France (1889)
Paradis Latin theatre, Paris, France (1889)
Jardín Juárez Gazebo, Cuernavaca, Morelos, México (1890)
Casa de Fierro, Iquitos, Peru (1892)
Estación Central (railway station), Santiago, Chile, (1897)
Iglesia de Santa Bárbara in Santa Rosalía, Baja California
Sur, Mexico (1897)
Lighthouse on Dzharylhach Island, Kherson region, Ukraine
(1902)
Aérodynamique EIFFEL (wind tunnel), Paris (Auteuil), France
(1911)
The Market, Olhão, Portugal
Palacio de Hierro,
Orizaba, Veracruz, Mexico
Catedral de Santa
María, Chiclayo, Peru (late 20th century)
Condominio Acero, Monterrey, Nuevo León, México
Combier Distillery, Saumur (Loire Valley), France
La Paz Bus Station
La Paz Train Station, La Paz, Bolivia (now La Paz Bus
Station)
Church in Coquimbo, Chile
Fénix Theatre, Arequipa, Peru
San Camilo Market, Arequipa, Peru
Farol de São Thomé, Campos, Brazil
Pabellon de la Rosa Piriápolis, Uruguay
Mercado Municipal, Manaus, Brazil
La Cristalera, old portuary storage, El Puerto de Santa
María, Spain
Clock Tower, Monte Cristi, Dominican Republic
Bridges and viaducts
Eiffel Bridge in Caminha
Eiffel Bridge in Ungheni
Eiffel Bridge in Sarajevo 1893, also known as Skenderija
Bridge, spans the Miljacka.
Railway Bridge over the river Garonne, Bordeaux (1861)
Viaduct over the river Sioule (1867)
Viaduct at Neuvial (1867)
Swing bridge at Dieppe (1870)
Pont de Ferro or Pont Eiffel in Girona, Spain. (1876)
Maria Pia Bridge (Douro Viaduct) (1877)
Cubzac Bridge over the Dordogne River, France (1880)
Borjomi Bridge over the Tsemistskali River, Georgia (1902)
Road Bridge over the river Tisza near Szeged, Hungary (1881)
Garabit Viaduct,
France (1884)
Imbaba Bridge over
the Nile River, Cairo, Egypt (1892)
The Eiffel Bridge in Zrenjanin (1904) (dismantled in the
1960s and currently being rebuilt.)
The road (D50) bridge over the River Lay at Lavaud in the
Vendée, France
Birsbrücke, Münchenstein, Switzerland which collapsed on 14
June 1891 killing over 70 people.
Bridge over the Schelde in Temse, Belgium
Souleuvre Viaduct (1893) (bridge spans removed but piers
survive)
The Eiffel Bridge in Viana do Castelo's Marina (1878)
The Railway Bridge over the Coura River in Caminha,
Portugal.
Eiffel Bridge in Ungheni, between Moldova and Romania (1877)
Great bridge over the Begej in Zrenjanin, Serbia, built in
1904, dismantled and replaced by concrete bridge in 1969
Ajfel Bridge on Skenderija Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Ghenh Bridge and Rach Cat Bridge in Bien Hoa city, Đồng Nai
Province, Vietnam.
Trường Tiền Bridge in Huế city, Thừa Thiên–Huế Province,
Vietnam.
Bolívar Bridge, at Arequipa, Peru
Puente Ferroviario Banco de Arena Railway Bridge near
Constitución, Chile
Puente Libertador, San Cristóbal, Venezuela.
The Railway Bridge in Przemyśl, Poland
Not proven
Basilica of San Sebastian, Manila, Philippines (1891)
Bridge over the Cuyuni River, southern Venezuela
Santa Efigênia Viaduct, São Paulo, Brazil (1913)
Santa Justa Lift (Carmo Lift), in Lisbon, Portugal (1901)
Dam on Great Bačka Canal, Bečej, Vojvodina, Serbia (1900)
Malleco Viaduct, Chile (1890)
The Chateau de Villersexel, France (c. 1871)
"Vuelta al Mundo", Córdoba, Argentina
Watermill, Dolores,
Córdoba, Argentina
Casa del Cura (also
called Casa Eiffel), in Ulea, Spain (1912)
Palácio de Ferro
(Iron Palace), Angola
Mercado 2 de Abril,
Mexico City
Unrealized projects
Trinity Bridge, Saint Petersburg – Eiffel entered a project
into the contest, but his project was not realized.
Protection of Gustave
Eiffel's heritage
A number Gustave Eiffel's works are in danger today. Some
have already been destroyed, as in Vietnam. A proposal to demolish the railway
bridge of Bordeaux (also known as the "passerelle St Jean"), Eiffel's
first major work, resulted in a large response from the public. Actions to
protect the bridge were taken as early as 2002 by the Association of the Descendants
of Gustave Eiffel, joined from 2005 onwards by the Association Sauvons la
Passerelle Eiffel ("Association to Save the Eiffel Bridge"). They
led, in 2010, to the decision to list Eiffel's Bordeaux Bridge as a French Historical
Monument.
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